I started out learning Erlang before Elixr had really crossed my radar. I have to say I prefer the Erlang syntax to the ruby-inspired Elixir. Maybe just a matter of what you know, I could see a RoR developer finding Elixir more appealing (I've never really used Ruby or Rails at all).
I am primarily a C# developer who learned Erlang (and did some small stuff in it) then moved to Elixir (I have never programmed in Ruby).
I think the huge extent of macros in Elixir is used extremely dangerously, and it can be very difficult to truly know what's going on behind the scenes sometimes.
That being said, I still prefer Elixir to Erlang for 2 reasons really.
1) I have a very iterative development style which involves a lot of refactoring and test -> code -> test -> code cycles that kept getting extremely frustrating with the ant-turd line endings. Honestly, if I could not have to deal with those line endings I probably would be more inclined to Erlang over Elixir
2) The testing infrastructure seemed much easier to use in Elixir than Erlang.
That being said, I don't see a purpose for Elixir or Erlang in the web serving space, and instead are using it for distributed (and non) stateful servers.
Agreed. The syntax and benefits would certainly appeal if I were a Ruby developer, but coming from a different perspective, I don't get the reason for all the love.
