Elixir setup - being consistent with schema

See Files on Github
common.ex
band.ex

It's typical to see timestamps() in every schema file, but what if you want to have the same primary key, schema prefix, or subset of columns in all the schema files.

First create your own using macro to handle the use/import statements along with any schema attributes.

 defmacro __using__(_) do quote do use Ecto.Schema import Ecto.Changeset import Portishead.Schema.Common @primary_key {:uuid, :binary_id, autogenerate: true} @schema_prefix "premarcos" end end 

Then define a macro that contains the common fields across all your schemas. You can use timestamps() or define your own date fields instead like created_at.

 defmacro common_fields do quote do # field :created_at, :utc_datetime_usec, autogenerate: {Ecto.Schema, DateTime.utc_now(), []} field :metadata, :string timestamps() end end 

Finally, in your schema file, use the module that was just created and call the common_fields macro.

defmodule Portishead.Schema.Band do use Portishead.Schema.Common schema "band" do common_fields() end 

Also worth reading

• https://bernheisel.com/blog/ecto_changeset_tips/