Autoloading NIFs on Nerves

Making load-time crashes easier to debug

Native Implemented Functions (NIFs) let you significantly speed up code or make system calls that would otherwise be unavailable. However, they come with a significant cost in that when they go wrong, they can take down the entire Erlang VM. This is particularly challenging when using NIFs with Nerves when crashes happen at boot time.

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nerves  elixir  nif 

You Gotta Have Heart

It’s one of an embedded developer’s worst nightmares: You have devices in the field, on remote sites, where you don’t have access to local staff to serve as your hands. You’re far from the devices, maybe on a different continent, even, and now you have a device that’s no longer responding to network requests, or not sending event data as expected. It is a terrible feeling. If you’re using Nerves to build firmware, you have tools at your disposal to help keep your devices online. [Read More]