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NixOS is what got me to switch back from Mac to Linux. Being able to copy someone else's config for my MacBookPro and have a pretty damn good, working system wa

• notheguyouthink 10y ago
  To add a bit more detail: It's not purely the syntax, but more difficulty finding API documentation to match "what i want to do". Eg, if i wanted to add a package, or if i wanted to add a custom package, what function would i use? (not a question directed at you). If i wanted to add a chroot, what would i use? What args are available on those functions? etcetc The documentation was a massive frustration to an already confused person. On top of that, it seemed every package/binary i wanted wasn't available in Nixpkgs, or was outdated in Nixpkgs - so i had to learn how to modify the binaries for pretty much everything i did. And, when you don't know what you're doing, this is a massive barrier to entry. I'm not too savvy on Linux and runtime requirements of binaries, so finding the requirements of a binary or setting up chroots for binaries that i could not modify was very time consuming. I spent most of my time doing that, in fact. The concept of NixOS represents time saved to me. Reproducible builds based on a idempotent config, awesome! But in reality, i had to figure out how to make everything i wanted idempotent, and it was just a massive barrier. I'm super smitten, i think the documentation just needs a bit of work. I would love to run it on my home server and also Nixpkgs on my Mac.