Nix
Nix is a purely functional package manager that aims to make package management reliable and reproducible.
Installation
There are three choices for installing Nix: the native Arch Linux package, the upstream installation script officially supported by Nix, and the "Zero to Nix" script provided by Determinate Systems, a company providing third party support for Nix.
Native
Upstream installation script
Download the file with curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSfL https://nixos.org/nix/install -o nix-install.sh, view it: less ./nix-install.sh, and run the script ./nix-install.sh --daemon to start Nix installation.
curl some-url | sh, as the Nix documentation suggests, is considered as a security risk, because it executes unknown code. Therefore it is recommended to manually download the script and check it, before executing it.Zero to Nix installation script
For an easier and less complicated Nix setup you can use the setup from Determinate Systems. Download the file with curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf -L https://install.determinate.systems/nix -o nix-install.sh, view it: less ./nix-install.sh, and run the script sh ./nix-install.sh install to start the installation.
curl some-url | sh, as Determinate Systems suggests, is considered as a security risk, because it executes unknown code. Therefore it is recommended to manually download the script and check it, before executing it.sh ./nix-install.sh install --diagnostic-endpoint="".For more information see the manual from Determinate Systems.
Configuration
To have the Nix daemon launched at boot time, enable nix-daemon.service.
Add required users to the nix-users group in order to access the daemon socket. Restart your session for the change to have an effect.
Add a channel and update it.
$ nix-channel --add https://nixos.org/channels/nixpkgs-unstable $ nix-channel --update
Usage
~/.nix-profile/bin directory to your PATH manually.With the shell configured, the following should install hello into your updated PATH:
$ nix-env -iA nixpkgs.hello
The binary itself will be located at /nix/store/[hash]-hello-[version]/bin/hello.
Run hello and make sure it is in the right PATH. If it works, you can remove it:
$ nix-env --uninstall hello
Or you can check the list of installed programs:
$ nix-env --query
You can also list generations:
$ nix-env --list-generations
See nix-env(1) for more detailed information.
Tips and tricks
Max jobs
By default, nix only uses one builder. The following will allow nix to use as many jobs as the number of CPUs:
/etc/nix/nix.conf
max-jobs = auto
Graphical acceleration
To run OpenGL and Vulkan applications, use NixGL.
Desktop integration
For integrating Nix applications with your desktop environment, add the ~/.nix-profile/share directory to your $XDG_DATA_DIRS, for instance using export XDG_DATA_DIRS=$HOME/.nix-profile/share:$XDG_DATA_DIRS.
Zsh integration for nix-shell
nix-shell starts Bash by default. zsh-nix-shellAUR lets you use Zsh as the default shell in a nix-shell environment. Some prompt plugins such as zsh-theme-powerlevel10kAUR and zsh-pure-promptAUR provide a nix-shell indicator.
Command completion
Zsh
nix-zsh-completionsAUR provides Zsh completions for nix commands such as nix-env and nix-shell.
Troubleshooting
Too many open files
Some builds may run into an error such as:
error: opening directory '/nix/store/...': Too many open files
Edit nix-daemon.service and increase the file limit:
[Service] LimitNOFILE=65536
Warning message about root user channels
If you get this error while using Nix:
warning: Nix search path entry '/nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels' does not exist, ignoring
The root user will need to update their channels:
# nix-channel --update
warning: Nix search path entry '/nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/<USER>/channels' does not exist, ignoring
See FS#78828. Alternatively, you can use the #Upstream installation script or #Zero to Nix installation script, which do not exhibit the issue.
error: file 'nixpkgs' was not found in the Nix search path (add it using $NIX_PATH or -I)
See FS#78828. Alternatively, you can use the #Upstream installation script or #Zero to Nix installation script, which do not exhibit the issue.
Sandbox build issues
Other sandbox issues
error: while setting up the build environment: mounting /proc: Operation not permitted error: program '/usr/bin/nix-env' failed with exit code 1
1: package 'utils' in options("defaultPackages") was not found
2: package 'stats' in options("defaultPackages") was not found
Error: .onLoad failed in loadNamespace() for 'utils', details:
call: system(paste(which, shQuote(names[i])), intern = TRUE, ignore.stderr = TRUE)
error: cannot popen '/nix/store/fnkvlbls29d01jcx3wsdnhykyrl7087r-which-2.21/bin/which 'uname' 2>/dev/null', probable reason 'Cannot allocate memory'
The issue is known upstream: #2311, #3000, and #4636.
nixpkgs expects to be built with the sandbox on.The most common fix is to disable sandboxing in the configuration file:
/etc/nix/nix.conf
# disable sandboxing sandbox = false
Then restart the nix-daemon service.
Locale warnings
The Nix wiki recommends running export LOCALE_ARCHIVE=/usr/lib/locale/locale-archive. Alternatively, export the environment variable LC_ALL=C.