Concurrent Data Processing in Elixir

Introducing the Task Module

To run code concurrently in Elixir, you have to start a process and execute your code within that process. You may also need to retrieve the result and use it for something else. Elixir provides a low-level function and a macro for doing this—spawn/1 and receive. However, using them could be tricky in practice, and you will likely end up with a lot of repetitive code.

Elixir also ships with a module called Task, which significantly simplifies starting concurrent processes. It provides an abstraction for running code concurrently, retrieving results, handling errors and starting a series of processes. It packs a lot of features and has a concise API, so there is rarely (if ever) need to use the more primitive spawn/1 ...