wtf is torch?

Torch is an admin panel generator for Phoenix web applications. Instead of building an admin interface from scratch, developers run a command and Torch automatically creates one, complete with pages to view, create, edit, and delete records in your database. You get a working admin dashboard in minutes rather than hours or days. The tool works by examining your database tables and generating all the necessary code: HTML pages, forms, styling, and backend logic. It creates a conventional admin interface that follows standard patterns, so you don't have to reinvent the wheel. Once generated, you can customize it further to match your app's specific needs. Think of it as a scaffolding tool that gets you 80% of the way there, so you only need to handle the unique 20%. Developers building web applications with Phoenix would use Torch when they need an admin panel, situations like managing blog posts, user accounts, products in an e-commerce site, or any other data that needs to be editable behind the scenes. Instead of hand-coding all those forms, tables, and pages, Torch generates them automatically. It's especially valuable for startups and small teams where you want to move fast and don't want to spend weeks building internal tools. The project is set up as a "monorepo" of sorts: the actual Torch generator lives in one folder, while a separate example application demonstrates what the generated code looks like in action. This setup helps the maintainers verify that the generated code actually works when you run a real Phoenix server. If you're contributing to Torch or exploring how it works, you can see live examples rather than just reading code.