Why and how to add Home Manager to NixOS

#1

Post by drakerossman » Sat, Jun 24, 2023, 2:04 PM UTC

Why and how to add Home Manager to NixOS
drakerossman.com

Re: Why and how to add Home Manager to NixOS

#2

Post by heyoni » Sat, Jun 24, 2023, 4:13 PM UTC

Drake, you misspelled your own book title on that page. Just search for “partical”.

Re: Why and how to add Home Manager to NixOS

#3

Post by __MatrixMan__ » Sat, Jun 24, 2023, 4:24 PM UTC

I've been meaning to switch home manager to flake mode. This will be helpful, thanks.

Re: Why and how to add Home Manager to NixOS

#4

Post by dundarious » Sat, Jun 24, 2023, 5:12 PM UTC

From the linked “how to enable flakes” article:

> As you can see, it uses our ./configuration.nix as a module. What are modules again? Per NixOS wiki:

> > Modules are files combined by NixOS to produce the full system configuration. A module contains a Nix expression. It declares options for other modules to define (give a value). It processes them and defines options declared in other modules.

> Simple as.

If only.

Also, the article is very much a How not a Why.

Re: Why and how to add Home Manager to NixOS

#5

Post by kaashif » Sat, Jun 24, 2023, 5:14 PM UTC

> If you happen to have a necessity for such a thing, you're better off using Home Manager, else you would end up implementing parts of Home Manager by yourself.

So if I need to do X then I should use Y, but why do I need to do X?

Maybe I'm missing it and it's really obvious.

Re: Why and how to add Home Manager to NixOS

#6

Post by tetris11 » Sat, Jun 24, 2023, 5:18 PM UTC

kaashif wrote: post #5

> If you happen to have a necessity for such a thing, you're better off using Home Manager, else you would end up implementing parts of Home Manager by yourself. So if I need to do X then I should use Y, but why do I need to do X? Maybe I'm missing it and it's really obvious.

User level dot files, instead of system wide

Re: Why and how to add Home Manager to NixOS

#7

Post by drakerossman » Sat, Jun 24, 2023, 5:29 PM UTC

dundarious wrote: post #4

From the linked “how to enable flakes” article: > As you can see, it uses our ./configuration.nix as a module. What are modules again? Per NixOS wiki: > > Modules are files combined by NixOS to produce the full system configuration. A module contains a Nix expression. It declares options for other modules to define (give a value). It processes them and defines options declared in other modules. > Simple as. If only.…

>If only.

Could you please elaborate?

Re: Why and how to add Home Manager to NixOS

#8

Post by drakerossman » Sat, Jun 24, 2023, 5:29 PM UTC

heyoni wrote: post #2

Drake, you misspelled your own book title on that page. Just search for “partical”.

Thank you for pointing that out!

Re: Why and how to add Home Manager to NixOS

#9

Post by heyoni » Sat, Jun 24, 2023, 5:31 PM UTC

drakerossman wrote: post #8

heyoni wrote: post #2

Drake, you misspelled your own book title on that page. Just search for “partical”.

Thank you for pointing that out!

no problem :)

Re: Why and how to add Home Manager to NixOS

#10

Post by tsuujin » Sat, Jun 24, 2023, 5:37 PM UTC

__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #3

I've been meaning to switch home manager to flake mode. This will be helpful, thanks.

I recently flipped my config over to a flake, and I’m glad I did. Feels like flakes are just easier to understand with less mystery.