# On "Why Elixir?"

**URL:** <https://forum.elixirforum.com/t/on-why-elixir/34038>\
**Category:** Discussions\
**Tags:** releases, elixir\
**Created:** [August 27, 2020, 7:03pm UTC](https://forum.elixirforum.com/t/on-why-elixir/34038 "2020-08-27T19:03:55Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 11

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**Author:** ![rvirding](https://forum.elixirforum.com/user_avatar/forum.elixirforum.com/rvirding/32/1409_2.png) [@rvirding](https://forum.elixirforum.com/u/rvirding)\
**Post date:** [August 28, 2020, 8:27am UTC](https://forum.elixirforum.com/t/on-why-elixir/34038/11 "2020-08-28T08:27:23Z")

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I just want to be a little picky here about release handling. It is **NOT** a language or libraries feature, there has been support in OTP from very early for releases. Support both for building them, see the `:systools` module in the [SASL application](https://erlang.org/doc/apps/sasl/index.html), and for doing configuration at startup time. It is the `mix` tool which in the beginning chose not to provide support for building releases. I don’t know why.

And I really agree Fred Hebert has written some really interesting and good stuff, both books and articles, which are also extremely readable. His [Learn You Some Erlang](https://learnyousomeerlang.com/) also describes releases 😄.

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