[Question] mix behavior change in 1.12.2

[Megzari Raphael]

Hi,

    First of all thank you for the amazing software!

    Following the release of elixir 1.12.2 mix will no longer find some libraries if they are simply added to the ERL_LIBS, dependencies need to be specifically present in the _build directory.

    I was wondering if that breaking change was intentional or if it might be reverted in the future? Since the behavior was never documented, I completely understand if there is no intention to bring it back. In NixOS we were relying on that behavior, and so for now the update to elixir 1.12.2 has been postponed until we know if this will be the future direction.

   I'm happy to provide more information if anything is vague.

Raphael

[José Valim]

If you have them listed as a dependency, then Mix has to control them. One option is to list them as path dependencies and point to them inside ERL_LIBS.

However, if they are in ERL_LIBS, you should not need to list them as dependencies at all, instead, you can simply include them in :extra_applications. That's how we load OTP and Elixir apps.