Elixir Function Capture

& is the capture operator in Elixir.

&Module.function/arity is shorthand for creating an anonymous function.

add_one = fn x -> x + 1 end

• Capture means & can turn a function into an anonymous functions which can be passed as arguments to other function or be bound to a variable.

So we can do things like this

speak = &(IO.puts/1)
speak.("hello")  # hello

The capture operator can also be used to create anonymous functions, for example:

add_one = &(&1 + 1)
add_one.(1) # 2

is the same with:

add_one = fn x -> x + 1 end
add_one.(1) # 2