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NixOS on a Tuxedo InfinityBook Pro 14 Gen9 AMD Laptop

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Re: NixOS on a Tuxedo InfinityBook Pro 14 Gen9 AMD Laptop

#31

Post by tombert »

throitallaway wrote: post #29
jowea wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You'd avoid the friction of having to deal with software that doesn't 'just work' on NixOS I'm not sure what type of software you're talking about, but Linux native software usually works with 'steam-run', which is really the "pretend to be Ubuntu" command.

Software that has only dynamically linked binaries available for it (and no source) are one such example. The main Azure CLI tool is built in Python but it downloads binaries for certain actions on the fly if it needs them. These are a major PITA (or impossible) to get working correctly on NixOS.

I agree it's annoying, though if you need dynamically linked stuff, there's always the FHS environments [1]. You can also do an FHS shell if you don't want to make a package.

There's also nix-ld [2], which allows you to directly run unpatched binaries.

[1] https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/blob/master/pkgs/by-name/bi...

[2] https://search.nixos.org/options?channel=unstable&show=progr...

Re: NixOS on a Tuxedo InfinityBook Pro 14 Gen9 AMD Laptop

#32

Post by dangus »

xorcist wrote: post #8
dangus wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like the Atomic Linux approach is already a better fit for desktop usage. Flatpaks for most user software along with other options to install packages with different methods if there are special/legacy requirements. I think the only negative aspect of the approach is the sheer quantity [1] of package installation options available. [1] https://docs.bazzite.gg/Installing_and_Managing_Software/

Flatpaks are a potential security disaster where people learn to install software of questionable provenance, not much different from other desktop operating systems where users learn to click past the warning to install binaries found on random web pages.

I feel like flathub and many App Store-like programs that install flatpaks do a good job showing app permissions, whether the apps are OSS, and whether the developer is verified.

I don’t see how it’s significantly different than the status quo on Windows/Mac.

Re: NixOS on a Tuxedo InfinityBook Pro 14 Gen9 AMD Laptop

#33

Post by dangus »

mhitza wrote: post #6
dangus wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like the Atomic Linux approach is already a better fit for desktop usage. Flatpaks for most user software along with other options to install packages with different methods if there are special/legacy requirements. I think the only negative aspect of the approach is the sheer quantity [1] of package installation options available. [1] https://docs.bazzite.gg/Installing_and_Managing_Software/

Flatpak makes it very hard to see who packages what. There are apps that look official, buy are built in third-party repositories. With distributions packages, there's a bigger barrier to entry which is at least better in avoiding sneaky malware from easily creeping in.

For one thing, barrier to entry is not a security feature. Malware has made its way into paid app stores.

I think someone running Linux wants low barrier to entry as a reason to use the system. They want a system built by communities and not by corporations with walled garden toll booth business models.

But this point is extremely weak either way when you compare to the Windows barrier to entry which is effectively zero. Or you can compare flatpak to Mac users installing software with Homebrew.

I think if you look at flathub there are very good explanations on each piece of software regarding whether the author is verified, what the license and code availability status of the package is, and which permissions are being used when installed. It seems to use relatively strong language to describe permissions features as potentially unsafe.

Re: NixOS on a Tuxedo InfinityBook Pro 14 Gen9 AMD Laptop

#34

Post by bjackman »

It's rather bleak that these special "Linux computers" require this much fiddling. None of my laptops are sold as running Linux but all of them were easier to set up than this (only the MacBook Air 2013 required anything at all other than running the Ubuntu installer and clicking "yes").

Re: NixOS on a Tuxedo InfinityBook Pro 14 Gen9 AMD Laptop

#35

Post by phibz »

brainlessdev wrote: post #25

Author here, posting a self-review. I've realized most of my blog post is not really about NixOS, it's just about this particular TUXEDO laptop requiring special tweaks to work properly. I've set up Debian 13 with Nix (plus Home Manager) in a VM to try it out and have realized that on the real laptop I would need to perform the same tweaks: install special drivers, install the TUXEDO Control Center (albeit using a su…

Excellent write up and great real world review. You mentioned wanting to become a generalist.

The missing applet for tuxedo-rs would be a great opportunity to "scratch an itch" and learn some new technology.

You have some options on the language you write the applet in if you're not ready to jump in to Rust or C.

Might be a great way to learn some stuff outside of web development.

Good luck.

Re: NixOS on a Tuxedo InfinityBook Pro 14 Gen9 AMD Laptop

#36

Post by smackeyacky »

bjackman wrote: post #34

It's rather bleak that these special "Linux computers" require this much fiddling. None of my laptops are sold as running Linux but all of them were easier to set up than this (only the MacBook Air 2013 required anything at all other than running the Ubuntu installer and clicking "yes").

My experience with Linux since the 1990s has been that bleeding edge hardware is never a great choice. I've had the best experience with slightly older laptops (typically bought 2nd hand).

Re: NixOS on a Tuxedo InfinityBook Pro 14 Gen9 AMD Laptop

#37

Post by antonvs »

bjackman wrote: post #34

It's rather bleak that these special "Linux computers" require this much fiddling. None of my laptops are sold as running Linux but all of them were easier to set up than this (only the MacBook Air 2013 required anything at all other than running the Ubuntu installer and clicking "yes").

The challenge here is installing NixOS. The ease of installing Linux on the laptops you've used is because someone else has already done this kind of work.

Re: NixOS on a Tuxedo InfinityBook Pro 14 Gen9 AMD Laptop

#38

Post by rgoulter »

tombert wrote: post #30
rgoulter wrote: post #2

The author mentions it in the conclusion, but I think "nix package manager on non-NixOS Linux" would be the best of both worlds. You'd avoid the friction of having to deal with software that doesn't 'just work' on NixOS, but still be able to make use of things like devenv. Though, an understated benefit from using NixOS is that the specific fixes taken are now available "as code".

A lot of people say this, but honestly this kind of sounds like someone who doesn't understand the ethos around NixOS. NixOS isn't just a vanilla Linux distro with Nix preinstalled The whole point of NixOS is that the entire system is managed by Nix. The entirety of everything is declarative in your configuration file(s) and the entire system can consistently be rebuilt from the configuration. The root system is immu…

OP had a situation where software he wanted to run didn't work with NixOS.

If OP wanted the benefits of the Nix package manager (e.g. per-project development environments, using Nix to build container images, etc.), and didn't want the friction of "how do I run this software on NixOS", I think it's straightforward that using Nix on a non-NixOS distro is a practical choice.

Re: NixOS on a Tuxedo InfinityBook Pro 14 Gen9 AMD Laptop

#39

Post by rgoulter »

jowea wrote: post #26
rgoulter wrote: post #2

The author mentions it in the conclusion, but I think "nix package manager on non-NixOS Linux" would be the best of both worlds. You'd avoid the friction of having to deal with software that doesn't 'just work' on NixOS, but still be able to make use of things like devenv. Though, an understated benefit from using NixOS is that the specific fixes taken are now available "as code".

> You'd avoid the friction of having to deal with software that doesn't 'just work' on NixOS I'm not sure what type of software you're talking about, but Linux native software usually works with 'steam-run', which is really the "pretend to be Ubuntu" command.

> I'm not sure what type of software you're talking about...

The original post mentions several examples where he ran into friction. (Monitoring/tracking software, pinentry-kwallet, playwright, tableplus).

A popular escape hatch for NixOS (or other immutable distros) for commandline tools is distrobox. https://github.com/89luca89/distrobox

Another good tip mentioned on the NixOS wiki FAQ is nix-ldd with the dependencies from steam-run.

Still. The benefit of having a declared system configuration does come with the cost of having to put in that effort up front; and a steeper learning curve for knowing how to get around those difficulties compared to more typical distros.

Re: NixOS on a Tuxedo InfinityBook Pro 14 Gen9 AMD Laptop

#40

Post by bjackman »

antonvs wrote: post #37
bjackman wrote: post #34

It's rather bleak that these special "Linux computers" require this much fiddling. None of my laptops are sold as running Linux but all of them were easier to set up than this (only the MacBook Air 2013 required anything at all other than running the Ubuntu installer and clicking "yes").

The challenge here is installing NixOS. The ease of installing Linux on the laptops you've used is because someone else has already done this kind of work.

I have installed NixOS on mainstream hardware and it doesn't involve any of the faffing discussed here. The HW-specific aspect of setup is normally completely automatic.
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