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Why I love NixOS

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Re: Why I love NixOS

#171

Post by computably »

sidkshatriya wrote: post #170
Phlebsy wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem that exists is that you cannot just willy nilly try out entirely different desktop envs/window managers/audio frameworks on an existing install of any other distro and be certain everything will work exactly as it was when you remove it. Especially as an only moderately knowledgeable user that won't know every single piece of config that needs to be changed back. Unless you're trying everything new out on…

Here is a simple workflow with mutable systems like Fedora that I think a lot of people are missing. AI could be brought into this workflow also for those who want that: (1) Take a snapshot of your current system (snapper+btrfs on Linux, bectl on FreeBSD+ZFS) (2) Make destructive changes like install a new windows manager, some drivers etc. (3) If everything worked out well, continue (4) If something failed badly, re…

Fedora also offers immutable distros which are (I've heard) much more user-friendly than Nix. Sure you can make a hacky pseudo-immutable workflow on a mutable distro but that's literally more effort for a worse result.

Re: Why I love NixOS

#172

Post by charlieflowers »

alembic_fumes wrote: post #104

The author almost touches on the one more topic that I adore about Nix, but ends up just so missing it: NixOS is absolutely incredible for its ability to be configured through AI tooling. And I don't mean that it's better than other operating systems, I mean that it's the only game in town. I've been using Nix, both the package manager and the operating system, for years by now. I agree with all of the author's point…

Tell me if I'm understanding you correctly. I summarize this in my head as, "This person loves NixOS because it gave him GitOps for his OS."

Re: Why I love NixOS

#173

Post by bivlked »

i've been tempted by NixOS for servers but keep going back to Debian. the reproducibility is amazing in theory, but when you need to debug a DKMS kernel module build at 2am on a VPS, having "just apt install" is worth a lot. maybe NixOS for dev workstations, Debian for production VPS is the right split.

Re: Why I love NixOS

#174

Post by exitb »

sidkshatriya wrote: post #170
Phlebsy wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem that exists is that you cannot just willy nilly try out entirely different desktop envs/window managers/audio frameworks on an existing install of any other distro and be certain everything will work exactly as it was when you remove it. Especially as an only moderately knowledgeable user that won't know every single piece of config that needs to be changed back. Unless you're trying everything new out on…

Here is a simple workflow with mutable systems like Fedora that I think a lot of people are missing. AI could be brought into this workflow also for those who want that: (1) Take a snapshot of your current system (snapper+btrfs on Linux, bectl on FreeBSD+ZFS) (2) Make destructive changes like install a new windows manager, some drivers etc. (3) If everything worked out well, continue (4) If something failed badly, re…

It’s like saying you don’t need a version control system for coding, as you can just make a copy of your sources before making important changes.

Re: Why I love NixOS

#175

Post by squiggleblaz »

charlieflowers wrote: post #172
alembic_fumes wrote: post #104

The author almost touches on the one more topic that I adore about Nix, but ends up just so missing it: NixOS is absolutely incredible for its ability to be configured through AI tooling. And I don't mean that it's better than other operating systems, I mean that it's the only game in town. I've been using Nix, both the package manager and the operating system, for years by now. I agree with all of the author's point…

Tell me if I'm understanding you correctly. I summarize this in my head as, "This person loves NixOS because it gave him GitOps for his OS."

I'm not OP but that's basically right. With NixOS, nix generates the system configuration as well as making sure the packages are available. If you pin your dependencies using something like nix flakes and rely on git as your source of truth, you can get GitOps for the operating system.

But it isn't necessary. You can certainly make a change and apply it without committing it to git or relying on a CI/CD pipeline to deploy it. And it isn't necessary to use input pinning - if you don't, you can wind up making it at best archaeological work to rollback. Most people recommend flakes nowadays though, whose input pinning and purity rules should prevent any need for archaeology if you do commit before applying.

Re: Why I love NixOS

#176

Post by rendaw »

cpuguy83 wrote: post #94
stephen_cagle wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you heard of any good projects for running isolated containers in NixOS that are cheaply derived from your own NixOS config? Because that is what I want. I want a computer where I can basically install every non stock app in its own little world, where it thinks "huh, that is interesting, I seem to be the only app installed on this system". Basically, I want to be able to run completely unverified code off of th…

You mean like https://wiki.nixos.org/wiki/NixOS_Containers ?

Can you do those ad-hoc though? I was looking into this too. I feel like it requires a system config change, apply, and then you need to do container start + machinectl login to actually get a shell.

That's definitely what I want... most of the time.

Re: Why I love NixOS

#177

Post by pkulak »

Iron_Ninja5 wrote: post #159
alembic_fumes wrote: post #104

The author almost touches on the one more topic that I adore about Nix, but ends up just so missing it: NixOS is absolutely incredible for its ability to be configured through AI tooling. And I don't mean that it's better than other operating systems, I mean that it's the only game in town. I've been using Nix, both the package manager and the operating system, for years by now. I agree with all of the author's point…

This feels like a very high-tech solution to a problem that doesn't really exist. Why involve an LLM to install Hyprland when "sudo dnf install hyprland" works fine? I feel like you're mistaking Nix being 'AI-ready' as a feature, when in reality, you're just forced to use an LLM because Nix is too annoying to manage manually.

Well,

programs.hyperland.enable = true

is your dnf equivalent on nix. But nix also lets you declare all your key bindings, load Noctalia with systemd, etc.

Re: Why I love NixOS

#178

Post by pkulak »

sidkshatriya wrote: post #170
Phlebsy wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem that exists is that you cannot just willy nilly try out entirely different desktop envs/window managers/audio frameworks on an existing install of any other distro and be certain everything will work exactly as it was when you remove it. Especially as an only moderately knowledgeable user that won't know every single piece of config that needs to be changed back. Unless you're trying everything new out on…

Here is a simple workflow with mutable systems like Fedora that I think a lot of people are missing. AI could be brought into this workflow also for those who want that: (1) Take a snapshot of your current system (snapper+btrfs on Linux, bectl on FreeBSD+ZFS) (2) Make destructive changes like install a new windows manager, some drivers etc. (3) If everything worked out well, continue (4) If something failed badly, re…

That’s a great way to get one of the benefits of nix. But you still can check that snapshot into version control, share it with all your machines, etc.

Re: Why I love NixOS

#179

Post by furryrain »

rendaw wrote: post #176
cpuguy83 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mean like https://wiki.nixos.org/wiki/NixOS_Containers ?

Can you do those ad-hoc though? I was looking into this too. I feel like it requires a system config change, apply, and then you need to do container start + machinectl login to actually get a shell. That's definitely what I want... most of the time.

Yes, NixOS containers can be run in:

* declarative mode, where your guest config is defined within your host config, or

* imperative mode, where your guest NixOS config is defined in a separate file. You can choose to reuse config between host and guest config files, of course.

It sounds like you want imperative containers. Here's the docs: https://nixos.org/manual/nixos/stable/#sec-imperative-contai...

Re: Why I love NixOS

#180

Post by Hasnep »

Havoc wrote: post #137

> I can specify the whole OS including the packages I need and the configuration in one declarative setup. That one place aspect matters to me more than it might sound at first. It took me less than a day of experimenting with it to learn that it is one place only in theory. The second you start googling „how do I install xyz“ you discover there are also flakes. And others have some sort of convoluted git like method…

I see your point about there being different ways to install a package, but I think I can clarify a bit by explaining how I use NixOS.

If I'm running a package on a server that means I want to install it declaratively, so I find the name of the package in Nixpkgs and put it in my `configuration.nix` file. I'm using flakes, but the configuration is exactly the same, I just put the package in the output section of the flake. Any instructions you see to install a package just boils down to finding the name of the package. To me this is as simple as finding the name of a Debian package and running `apt` to install it.

If you want additional features there are other optional ways to install packages, but these are features other distros don't offer, so if you just ignore them then there's no extra complexity compared to Debian for example.

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