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Show HN: Flox 1.0 – Open-source dev env as code with Nix

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Show HN: Flox 1.0 – Open-source dev env as code with Nix

#1

Post by ronef »

Hey HN,

I'm Ron Efroni, CEO at Flox, and today we are releasing version 1.0 of our open source CLI, helping folks manage development environments everywhere.My own experience with development environments began with air-gapped systems, having to actually burn software to a CD to iterate over a very slow and expensive development cycle, sometimes reaching the server rack and realizing I have the wrong disk.... Fast forward to today and there are countless alternatives available backed by incredible compute resources, yet we somehow still find ourselves paying the price of long development cycles. That's why I've been working for over a decade to simplify the development stack so we can spend more time on making 1's and 0's do magical things, and why my co-founder Michael and I started Flox to bring you the solution based on Nix. Today is just the first step on that journey. We hope you'll take a peek at our new release, and very much look forward to continuing the journey with you from here together!

Introducing Flox 1.0

Flox is a platform that lets developers and operators focus on building fast with reproducible environments that span the enterprise SDLC. Using a declarative framework based on Nix, a package management and configuration tool, Flox allows developers to create environments that contain everything they need to build software.

Why Flox?

Flox behaves a lot like your favorite and familiar package manager, but it allows you to create as many environments as you want on your machine. Each one can contain a different combination of packages.

Environments are portable by default. If you install a package inside one that isn't cross-platform, it's easy to carve out exceptions. It's also easy to write hooks and populate your environment with variables - we designed it to be hackable.

Flox environments run in user-space, like, where you are. When you type `ls` after activating a Flox environment you will see the same stuff because you're in the same place - even with all those new packages available. No mounting volumes, no proxying ports. No breaking into the toolset you just conjured.

Getting Started: No sign-ups, just one install away. Dive into our GitHub repository (https://github.com/flox/flox) and start exploring

I’m around all day to answer questions, talk Nix, or just reminisce about simpler times ;).

Lots of open source love, Ron

Show HN: Flox 1.0 – Open-source dev env as code with Nix
github.com

Re: Show HN: Flox 1.0 – Open-source dev env as code with Nix

#5

Post by e3bc54b2 »

If I understand correctly, the linked repo is for flox CLI client. While it is welcome, is there a plan to open source the service components? I'd like to deploy flox on my own and have portable environments. Otherwise this I'd just another SaaS with lock-in and "lots of open source love".

Re: Show HN: Flox 1.0 – Open-source dev env as code with Nix

#6

Post by ronef »

e3bc54b2 wrote: post #5

If I understand correctly, the linked repo is for flox CLI client. While it is welcome, is there a plan to open source the service components? I'd like to deploy flox on my own and have portable environments. Otherwise this I'd just another SaaS with lock-in and "lots of open source love".

we will always allow the CLI to stand alone for a local developer or CI runner. the service side of Flox is for those who want a faster performance, easy sharing, or eventually enterprise control. so while the CLI can use the closed service it's purely optional (and will always be optional)

Re: Show HN: Flox 1.0 – Open-source dev env as code with Nix

#8

Post by anonzzzies »

slekker wrote: post #7
mrd3v0 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or https://devenv.sh

or https://www.jetpack.io/devbox/ :ˆ)

Ah! The modern hell of choice. Can’t these peeps just work together and make one great thing instead of fragmenting over and over? I think I know the answers but have to ask anyway, hope to learn.

Re: Show HN: Flox 1.0 – Open-source dev env as code with Nix

#10

Post by mkenigs »

ivanjermakov wrote: post #3

What is the benefit of using Flox over plain nix-shell or nix develop?

Flox employee here! To start off by addressing how this relates to nix tools:

- Our goal is to be more user friendly. You don't have to learn the Nix expression language or understand nix internals to be successful.

- We've been able to add some opinionation and polish. Some of that is subjective, but some examples are:

  - We have a hybrid imperative/declarative interface. You can `flox install && flox list`, and those changes are reflected in TOML. Whereas with `nix develop` you have to edit a Nix expression

  - `nix develop` drops you into a bash shell, whereas `flox activate` can drop you into a bash or zsh shell (and we plan to add support for fish)
- We support using git to manage environments just like nix tools do, but we've also added the option to share flox environments in ways you can't with any of those tools (flox push/flox pull/flox activate -r) and the ability to view environments in ways we feel can be more user friendly. If you create an account, you can see packages I have in my environment at https://hub.flox.dev/mkenigs/default, or if you have the CLI, you could inspect my environment with `flox list -r mkenigs/default` before using it with `flox activate -r mkenigs/default`. I think that's much more digestible than linking a flake.nix to someone who doesn't know the Nix expression language
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