4 ms·

I really dislike Nix/NixOS, but I think it's kind of unreasonable to claim something is unappealing because of a learning curve. Pretty much everything on the p

by kick 6y ago

I really dislike Nix/NixOS, but I think it's kind of unreasonable to claim something is unappealing because of a learning curve. Pretty much everything on the planet has a learning curve; if a project is genuinely innovative or aiming for a paradigm shift, and you find the benefits of it worthwhile, there's probably always going to be a learning curve. That said, are we really reading the same post? What's presented here is...really simple, and you should be pretty much familiar with most of it if you actually set up Gentoo and Arch in the past; pretty much everything directly translates that requires user interaction in this, and the package format is pretty similar to write & read, too.

methyl 6y ago
> it's kind of unreasonable to claim something is unappealing because of a learning curve. It's not unreasonable at all. It all depends who is claiming that. Consider Mac OS and compare it to any Linux in terms of the learning curve. Can my mother say that Linux is unappealing because it's to hard to learn it? Of course. Even among engineers there are people to prefer just getting the stuff done without spending hours or weeks on configuring their environment (even if it could pay off).
- pjmlp 6y ago
  Like game developers, graphical developers, app developers, actually anyone selling desktop and mobile OS software. The domain still waiting for Desktop Linux to happen.
- kick 6y ago
  The appealing features of whatever it is are still appealing despite the learning curve. To highlight what I object to, because I feel I may have come across ambiguously: Not much about all this setup feels appealing. The good features about, say, OS X, are not made less appealing because of the rest of OS X. They're still appealing properties.
  - elbear 6y ago
    I think you're missing a variable: point of view. Give positive points to any feature you find appealing. Give negative points to any feature you find unappealing. If you have the person you're speaking to go through the same process, you might find you've assigned points differently. And the net sum might be closer to zero for them. That's what makes going through the entire process unappealing for them.
    - kick 6y ago
      I'm not missing that variable; the comment you're replying to was explicitly written to try and clear up that I was not missing that variable.
ithkuil 6y ago
> I really dislike Nix/NixOS I'm honestly curious why you dislike it
- kick 6y ago
  In order from most to least, all concerns but some that I'm usually happy overlooking: * Poorly-implemented versions of theoretically-interesting ideas * Poor implementations, technically * Lacking merit compared to its best competitor (insofar as free software has competitors) * Lacking merit compared to its main competitor * Deep philosophical and moral disagreements * Toxic and obnoxious community This isn't to say it's bad, of course. It's just something I dislike; I seek no wider war.
  - the_duke 6y ago
    That doesn't really answer much, can you be more specific? Why is it poorly implemented, what are the problems? Who is the competitor, and why is it better? (Guix?) What are the philosophical issues? How is the community toxic and obnoxius? Personally there are a few things that annoy me about Nix, mostly implementation and documentation wise. Also, the language is pretty odd and the CLI UX is somewhat messy. But the community (IRC / Discourse) has been pretty helpful for me thus far.
    - kick 6y ago
      I'd prefer not to be more specific, actually; at least on most points. Complaining about popular new things in threads about them is a trend I find irritating, and using a thread about how someone finds something cool to give reasoning as to why it's distasteful is completely off-topic and kind of rude, anyhow. However, I will note that I listed two competitors, not one, and while I think both have more merit, I only think the best is worth using out of all three. I'll point out that it's not Guix, and that it's older than Nix, but I don't think advertising alternatives is a particularly nice thing to do in a thread about any given piece of free software.
      - 6y ago

by kick 6y ago

methyl 6y ago

> it's kind of unreasonable to claim something is unappealing because of a learning curve. It's not unreasonable at all. It all depends who is claiming that. Consider Mac OS and compare it to any Linux in terms of the learning curve. Can my mother say that Linux is unappealing because it's to hard to learn it? Of course. Even among engineers there are people to prefer just getting the stuff done without spending hours or weeks on configuring their environment (even if it could pay off).

pjmlp 6y ago
Like game developers, graphical developers, app developers, actually anyone selling desktop and mobile OS software. The domain still waiting for Desktop Linux to happen.
kick 6y ago
The appealing features of whatever it is are still appealing despite the learning curve. To highlight what I object to, because I feel I may have come across ambiguously: Not much about all this setup feels appealing. The good features about, say, OS X, are not made less appealing because of the rest of OS X. They're still appealing properties.
- elbear 6y ago
  I think you're missing a variable: point of view. Give positive points to any feature you find appealing. Give negative points to any feature you find unappealing. If you have the person you're speaking to go through the same process, you might find you've assigned points differently. And the net sum might be closer to zero for them. That's what makes going through the entire process unappealing for them.
  - kick 6y ago
    I'm not missing that variable; the comment you're replying to was explicitly written to try and clear up that I was not missing that variable.

ithkuil 6y ago

> I really dislike Nix/NixOS I'm honestly curious why you dislike it

kick 6y ago
In order from most to least, all concerns but some that I'm usually happy overlooking: * Poorly-implemented versions of theoretically-interesting ideas * Poor implementations, technically * Lacking merit compared to its best competitor (insofar as free software has competitors) * Lacking merit compared to its main competitor * Deep philosophical and moral disagreements * Toxic and obnoxious community This isn't to say it's bad, of course. It's just something I dislike; I seek no wider war.
- the_duke 6y ago
  That doesn't really answer much, can you be more specific? Why is it poorly implemented, what are the problems? Who is the competitor, and why is it better? (Guix?) What are the philosophical issues? How is the community toxic and obnoxius? Personally there are a few things that annoy me about Nix, mostly implementation and documentation wise. Also, the language is pretty odd and the CLI UX is somewhat messy. But the community (IRC / Discourse) has been pretty helpful for me thus far.
  - kick 6y ago
    I'd prefer not to be more specific, actually; at least on most points. Complaining about popular new things in threads about them is a trend I find irritating, and using a thread about how someone finds something cool to give reasoning as to why it's distasteful is completely off-topic and kind of rude, anyhow. However, I will note that I listed two competitors, not one, and while I think both have more merit, I only think the best is worth using out of all three. I'll point out that it's not Guix, and that it's older than Nix, but I don't think advertising alternatives is a particularly nice thing to do in a thread about any given piece of free software.
    - 6y ago