Hi everyone!

I saw that NixOS is getting popularity recently. I really have no idea why and how this OS works. Can you guys help me understanding all of this ?

Thanks !

  • moldyringwald@kbin.social
    7·
    2 years ago

    It’s insanely stable but you have to have a lot of linux/programming knowledge to do even the simplest things like installing/updating your software or making little tweaks. I played with it for hours the other day and I’m just too dumb to figure it out lol I think it’s just a super stable highly customizable distro for power users and a lot of people like that. If you can get over the learning curve it’s a pretty powerful and unique os

    • Chobbes@lemmy.world
      1·
      2 years ago

      It’s kind of funny because I’d put NixOS on a complete newbies computer for sure, and recommend it to an expert… But I’m less sure if I’d tell a random mid-intermediate Linux user to switch.

      Like if Grandma wants Linux on their computer to do some internet browsing for some reason… I’d absolutely put NixOS on it because it’s easy to manage the system for them… But somebody who is a little familiar with Linux already might be more confused about the differences. It’s kind of the ultimate beginner distro and the ultimate power-user distro, but a bit awkward between those extremes, haha.

    • Glome@kbin.social
      1·
      2 years ago

      It’s true that it can be a powerful distro but I’ve also heard from some users that the advanced-level documentation is lacking and only limited to forums and source code. I think maybe if the documentation was more thorough I would try nixos.

    • RosalynKirk@kbin.social
      03·
      2 years ago

      you have to have a lot of linux/programming knowledge to do even the simplest things like installing/updating your software

      So, pretty much like any other distro

        • RosalynKirk@kbin.social
          01·
          2 years ago

          Weird, every distro I’ve tried either has no management, or doesn’t work. Just spins around loading. “Uninstalling” packages does nothing but remove them from the package manager.

  • fazo96@lemmy.trippy.pizza
    5·
    2 years ago

    I have been using for years on servers. My lemmy instance is hosted on it.

    Although for desktop I had too many issues back in 2019 so I ended up back to Arch Linux and then EndeavourOS

    Would be fun to try again to use it on desktop

    • dbemol@lemmy.dbzer0.com
      1·
      2 years ago

      I think I will give it a try on a server first, I don’t have a playbook or script for a reproducible set up (yet), so I may as well use Nix to see if it’s worth the hype

  • lloram239@feddit.de
    5·
    2 years ago

    NixOS is the only[1] Linux distribution that feels like it is build around Free Software. Meaning upstream Git repositories can be treated as first-class citizen and installed directly without convoluted binary packaging system (that still exists in the background, but only as cache to speed up build times). Nix also makes it very easy to upgrade, downgrade, side grade, patch, override dependencies or otherwise change packages, or even just keep multiple versions of the same software around. Something many other distributions still struggle with or make completely impossible with the distributions own tools. Even the act of installing software in Nix becomes somewhat unnecessary, as you can just run software straight from the Git repository.

    And best of all, it’s all based on a very simple and transparent packaging system, if you ever used GNU stow, kind of like that, it’s all held together with a bunch of symlinks and some environment variables. No contains, no ostree, none of those ugly workarounds, just plain old Unix stuff that you can find and grep through as much as you like.

    Simply put, NixOS puts the joy back in Linux, while other distributions like Ubuntu try to actively trash their reputation with a proprietary App store and others like Debian just stagnate around and are still stuck with the same old packing system that was state of the art 25 years ago and hasn’t improve much at all since than. NixOS just provides a dramatically cleaner and simpler approach that also happens to be vastly more powerful.

    Another cool thing, if you don’t wanna switch distributions just yet and reinstall the full NixOS, you can just use the Nix package manager itself on whatever distribution you are already using.

    [1] There is also GNU Guix, which is basically a reimplementation of Nix with Guile/Scheme

  • featherfurl@lemmy.ml
    5·
    2 years ago

    Here’s the straightforward version of why I use it:

    1. The entire state of your operating system is defined in a config file, and changes are made by changing the config file. This makes it super easy to reproduce your exact system many times and to know where all the many different configuration elements that describe your system are located.

    2. Updates are applied atomically, so you don’t have to worry about interrupting the update process and if it fails, the previous state of your system is still bootable. By default every time you change something, you get another option in the boot menu to roll back to.

    3. Making container-like sub systems is super easy when you’re familiar with nix, so you can have as many different enclaves as you like for different software versions, development environments, desktop setups, whatever without taking a performance hit. Old versions of stuff are very accessible without breaking your new stuff.

    4. The package manager has a lot of software and accessing nonfree stuff is straightforward. Guix looks rad, but nix ended up being the more practical compromise for my usecase. I didn’t want to have to package a heap of software the moment I made the switch.

    • SolemnAttic@feddit.de
      1·
      2 years ago

      This very much. I used to have lots of unchecked config and state files everywhere on Arch. Now everything is checked in and wiped on boot so if something breaks after a reboot i know what broke.

      Like how the opengl rendering did due to nixpkgs version differences

  • mrh@mander.xyz
    4·
    2 years ago

    I daily drive GNU Guix instead, and I would strongly recommend any emacs and/or lisp enthusiasts interested in the benefits of functional, reproducible, declarative, and hackable system management to give it a try!

    • NCR Ranger@sh.itjust.works
      2·
      2 years ago

      Do you run the gnu guix distro or just use the package manager? Because iirc it uses only free software, even for drivers. So I imagine it is not that easy to find compatible hardware.

      • mrh@mander.xyz
        3·
        2 years ago

        I run the complete system. It’s true that the standard iso comes with the linux-libre kernel and the standard channel (think repo) contains only free software. However there is the nonguix channel which comes with the full linux kernel, and all the proprietary drivers you could ask for.

        Nonguix offer an iso with the full kernel too in case you have a proprietary wifi card and don’t have ethernet for the initial setup. The nonguix README I think is pretty clear, but Systemcrafters also made an excellent guide for doing this.

        My wifi card unfortunately requires proprietary drivers and I have personally never had an issue with guix + nonguix for all my software needs, proprietary and otherwise.

        Hope that helps profligate!

  • Tilted@programming.dev
    51·
    2 years ago

    I used NixOS for a couple of years. My experience is like this:

    1. It is a rolling release (mostly)
    2. You write a declarative configuration for your system, e.g., my config will say I want Neovim with certain plugins, and I can also include my Neovim configuration
    3. It is stable, and when it breaks it is easy to go back
    4. Packages are mostly bleeding edge
      • Tilted@programming.dev
        2·
        2 years ago

        Yes absolutely. It is really great. It is also a source of frustration, e.g., missing configuration options, non-obvious options and so on. Overall it works well.

      • Sr Estegosaurio@lemmy.ml
        1·
        2 years ago

        You can even define configurations for different systems/hosts/users from a single place. I’ev atomized my config and I can reuse lots of parts for my different machines. Also my user config is nearly identical (except hardware specific things).

    • priapus@lemmy.one
      2·
      2 years ago

      Important to note that NixOS has both a rolling release and point release version.

    • Atemu@lemmy.ml
      2·
      2 years ago

      Note that there’s both the rolling unstable channel and a bi-annual stable release channel.

    • SirNuke@kbin.social
      0·
      2 years ago

      Are you still using it and happy with it? I’ve been increasingly using single purpose dev VMs in a server, and a declarative configuration system would make the process of spinning them up faster and more robust. My current shell script system is clunky, and I’ve been looking at Ansible.

      • Tilted@programming.dev
        1·
        2 years ago

        Not using it anymore. Although I’m thinking about going back to it. The NixOS learning curve is a bit more steep than most other distros.

  • Cegorach@feddit.de
    3·
    2 years ago

    nah

    didn’t have enough time during the last half a decade to learn yet another thing

    might be better fit than my current debian setup - but how would I ever know, since my current thing is good enough?

  • datendefekt@lemmy.ml
    3·
    2 years ago

    Glancing over the website, I thought it’s an immutable OS, like Fedora Silverblue. I could imagine that it might be cool to use with Ansible and stuff. But for an average user? I can’t really see the advantages in respect to the work you have to put in.

  • Litanys@lem.cochrun.xyzEnglish
    2·
    2 years ago

    I’ve been using it for over a year and love it. A config file for your entire system, and built in rollbacks anytime something goes wrong. One language to configure everything, although in practice that doesn’t always work. But I love it.

    Some others have started why it works, here is some how. Nixos completely disregards the fhs. Packages don’t install to anywhere standard, every package and configuration change gets it’s on directory in /nix/store but through smart use of tracking everything there, it symlinks all those files to proper places and sets up the environment for them to know where libraries are.

    This is then also why you don’t need sudo privileges to install things. Your profile has an environment that is aware of your users packages and configurations, the system itself isn’t effected because everything is symlinked.

    Then because every update means new directories in /nix/store you can role back to your last configuration because plasma broke something or whatever.

    However, it’s a LOT to learn. Best place I know of is https://piped.video/watch?v=AGVXJ-TIv3Y&t=0

    This guy did a good job for me. Hope this helps!

  • Lalelul@feddit.de
    2·
    2 years ago

    I switched around one and a half years ago. I must say, there are some hurdles to using NixOS. Mainly I dislike that it always takes around 20 times the effort to start and project. You make up for the initial time investment, because you end up with a far more stable setup, but still it does take some willpower to get things started.