It's a great video, and I hope the author is able to publish more nix content like this again soon. We'll just have to watch their blog's RSS feed in the meantime.
ruffsl
joined 2 years ago
Hello Patrick! Thanks for the writeup; gradually incorporating it into my config.
BTW, I recall reading a PR you started on fixing the fallback from failing substituters? This may be of interest to you:
That is a bizarre looking error. What architecture is your host system? Is your config repo publicly viewable? Installing tail scale is your only build issue?
Only not by itself, no? Couldn't it be combined with any of those X11 server apps for hosting a display socket over the local loop back?
Whoops, I misread scheme as schema. That's really powerful. One thing I wish I could reliably do with a Nix LSP is navigate to a definition of a symbol.
Still seems a little too idealistic, not sure how this would really shake down with more complex build systems or multilingual projects.
I haven't dug into Guix yet, so is the config more of a markup and less of Turing complete language? That sounds like it'd be easier to grock or optimize an LSP for.
I have heard that Guix takes a stronger stance with respect to unfree software. I don't think any of the official nix Hydra infrastructures build for unfree packages, but they are packaged and indexed into nixpkgs. Has Guix been difficult at all in that regard, i.e. using proprietary drivers or closed libraries for work or personal hardware?
As soon as you veer off the beaten path, things can get really tricky.
For med tech and robotics development, I'm still using Debian via docker because the surrounding ecosystems for those software communities are so tightly integrated with the Debian.
Hey do we have a central place with everyoneβs configuration file ?
As roundabout as it sounds I've had good luck using GitHub's code search with language:nix and path:flake.nix modifiers.
E.g, I was looking for complete flake examples to overlay nvidia drivers from the unstable branch/channel, I used this regex:
- https://github.com/search?q=language%3Anix+%2Fhardware.nvidia%2F+%2Fpackage+%3D+.*unstable%2F&type=code
Most folks publishing their configs often have more advance setups, but still nice trace git blame to learn how they evolved.
some config file editor where I can just toggle kde + nvidia drivers +
There is SnowflakeOS this kind of stalled, but that could change with recent improvements to structured edits of Nix:
I think installing NixOS is something that could really benefit from more community mentoring or nearby a local linux user group.
Now that I have a working config for my hardware, I feel like I could explain it all to my old self in under half an hour. But to get to that point of familiarity took a few days. Having someone over your shoulder to save a new user most of any trial and error could go a long way in terms of adoption or bounce rate. It's like subject that can be tricky to approach solo, but could be trivial if tutored even slightly formally.
If you also like me prefer spoken/visual instructions over written forms, I'd also recommend these resources:
Well let me at least leave why I think Nix is not it at the moment:
- Software Center - browsing search.nixos.org isn't quite the same in terms low friction and discoverability
- You already have to know what you're looking for, and it can't make system config on your behalf
- Debian or conventional package managers usually offer a native GUI for package selection and deployment
- System Defaults - the minimality of a basic default install can cause a lot of papercuts
- the default boot partition is rather small given the OS's prepecity to add new kernels with new generations
- and without any garbage collection service enabled by default, user first encounter switch failures due to this
- External Binaries Compatibility - Linux also suffers from this in general as compared to MacOS or Windows
- in addition to being much more niche, reuse of existing binaries from more prevalent distros becomes complicated
- the desktop ISO could suggest a nix-ld config with default libs most binary distributes expect, easing in new users
- The Nix language - much more complex than conventional cong markup langs, being more of a turing complete DSL
- partial working LSP impare introspection while writing, and the runtime error messages are poorly formatted
- most desktop users (in debian or fedora) have little need to learn their OS's packaging schemas, but NixOS users do
Check out the nix config repo from Unmoved Centre: