--- title: An Agent Skill for Updating Elixir Dependencies | daily.dev description: A walkthrough of building a custom AI agent skill for Claude that automates updating Elixir dependencies, going beyond Dependabot's lock-file-only PRs. The... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/an-agent-skill-for-updating-elixir-dependencies-0v8pphegb twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: An Agent Skill for Updating Elixir Dependencies | daily.dev og:description: A walkthrough of building a custom AI agent skill for Claude that automates updating Elixir dependencies, going beyond Dependabot's lock-file-only PRs. The... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/an-agent-skill-for-updating-elixir-dependencies-0v8pphegb og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/0V8ppHeGb.png og:image:alt: An Agent Skill for Updating Elixir Dependencies og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # An Agent Skill for Updating Elixir Dependencies **[ElixirStatus](https://daily.dev/sources/elixirstatus)** · 4 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary A walkthrough of building a custom AI agent skill for Claude that automates updating Elixir dependencies, going beyond Dependabot's lock-file-only PRs. The skill identifies outdated libraries, applies updates, reads changelogs to determine necessary code changes, verifies CI passes, and produces a documented pull request with hex diffs and transitive dependency notes. The author still runs Dependabot alongside it and stresses that automation doesn't remove the need to actually read the code and changelogs. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### What is an agent skill in AI coding tools like Claude? An agent skill is a lightweight, open-format folder containing a SKILL.md file with metadata (at minimum a name and description) and instructions telling an AI agent how to perform a specific task. Skills can also bundle scripts, reference materials, and templates in optional subfolders like scripts/, references/, and assets/, and can be scoped to manual invocation or triggered directly by the model. _daily.dev surfaces practical writeups like this for developers building their own agent skills._ ### How can I automate Elixir dependency updates with an AI agent instead of just using Dependabot? A custom agent skill can identify outdated Elixir libraries, apply the updates, read through changelogs and diffs to determine if project code changes are needed, verify the build stays green under CI guardrails, and then open a pull request with inline changelog notes, links to hex diffs, and a list of affected transitive dependencies, going beyond Dependabot's mix.lock-only changes. _Elixir developers weighing agent-driven automation against Dependabot can track approaches like this on daily.dev._ ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [The Skills Conundrum](https://daily.dev/posts/the-skills-conundrum-twnakb4rr) · Swiftjective-C · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Agent Skills explained: Replacing AGENTS.md with reusable AI knowledge](https://daily.dev/posts/agent-skills-explained-replacing-agents-md-with-reusable-ai-knowledge-4lgrqdva9) · SwiftLee · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [AI in Focus: A new Claude Skill for Rails code audits](https://daily.dev/posts/ai-in-focus-a-new-claude-skill-for-rails-code-audits-rz5imfffg) · thoughbot · 1 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#ai-agents](https://daily.dev/tags/ai-agents), [#claude](https://daily.dev/tags/claude), [#elixir](https://daily.dev/tags/elixir), [#dependabot](https://daily.dev/tags/dependabot) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/an-agent-skill-for-updating-elixir-dependencies-0v8pphegb) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"An Agent Skill for Updating Elixir Dependencies","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/an-agent-skill-for-updating-elixir-dependencies-0v8pphegb","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/an-agent-skill-for-updating-elixir-dependencies-0v8pphegb"},"datePublished":"2026-08-14T14:39:54.918Z","dateModified":"2026-09-13T20:58:26.922Z","description":"A walkthrough of building a custom AI agent skill for Claude that automates updating Elixir dependencies, going beyond Dependabot's lock-file-only PRs. The...","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/acea59cb42ff1d7283cead07d9fc663c?_a=AQAEuop","thumbnailUrl":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/acea59cb42ff1d7283cead07d9fc663c?_a=AQAEuop","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"ElixirStatus","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"ElixirStatus","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/t_logo,f_auto/v1/logos/22e4640538124187827caf8cc8e39190","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/elixirstatus"},"commentCount":0,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/an-agent-skill-for-updating-elixir-dependencies-0v8pphegb","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":0},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":0}],"keywords":"ai-agents,claude,elixir,dependabot","timeRequired":"PT4M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"ElixirStatus","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/elixirstatus"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"An Agent Skill for Updating Elixir Dependencies"}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"FAQPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/an-agent-skill-for-updating-elixir-dependencies-0v8pphegb#faq","mainEntity":[{"@type":"Question","name":"What is an agent skill in AI coding tools like Claude?","acceptedAnswer":{"@type":"Answer","text":"An agent skill is a lightweight, open-format folder containing a SKILL.md file with metadata (at minimum a name and description) and instructions telling an AI agent how to perform a specific task. Skills can also bundle scripts, reference materials, and templates in optional subfolders like scripts/, references/, and assets/, and can be scoped to manual invocation or triggered directly by the model. daily.dev surfaces practical writeups like this for developers building their own agent skills."}},{"@type":"Question","name":"How can I automate Elixir dependency updates with an AI agent instead of just using Dependabot?","acceptedAnswer":{"@type":"Answer","text":"A custom agent skill can identify outdated Elixir libraries, apply the updates, read through changelogs and diffs to determine if project code changes are needed, verify the build stays green under CI guardrails, and then open a pull request with inline changelog notes, links to hex diffs, and a list of affected transitive dependencies, going beyond Dependabot's mix.lock-only changes. Elixir developers weighing agent-driven automation against Dependabot can track approaches like this on daily.dev."}}]} ```