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I started using nix. It’s difficult and search results are not often helpful.

Smaug123 5y ago
Fight through it for another couple of weekends - the Stockholm syndrome feels sooo gooooood! I found it much more helpful to find people's own Nix setups and learn from them, by the way. Mine is at https://github.com/Smaug123/nix-dotfiles https://github.com/Smaug123/nix-dotfiles - like all such things, it's a WIP, and I'm definitely still a noob, but bits of it may be able to help.
Majestic121 5y ago
Your honesty is refreshing. I've seen countless people trying a new technology/tool, and overselling it as 'amazing' and super easy. Seeing a post like yours helps to keep the discussion grounded in reality, with tools that looks nice on paper but have practical downsides as well.
- abathur 5y ago
  I agree with this general sentiment, but I'll add that it's worth reading most posts about Nix through this lens. Finding your sea legs is rough, and IME people who completely deny this are few and far between. The reward is a pretty impressive lever.
  - ronenlh 5y ago
    The thing I use and like most in nix is nix-shell. I set up a shell.nix file on my projects, and together with direnv the environment switches with the right dependencies for each project. Shameless plug, I wrote about this recently on medium: https://link.medium.com/cYkKMtdHRkb https://link.medium.com/cYkKMtdHRkb
- pxc 5y ago
  Nix IS amazing. It is NOT super easy. Parts of it are getting easier, and it has an exceptionally smart and helpful community. But it's not smooth and pretty and easy to pick up like Homebrew is. (And that does suck)
peterhil 5y ago
Nox is much easier interface to nix. I often use that instead of nix-env.
ghostwriter 5y ago
you can search via web interface - https://search.nixos.org/packages?channel=nixpkgs-unstable https://search.nixos.org/packages?channel=nixpkgs-unstable
- Smaug123 5y ago
  Finding packages is not the hard bit :P the hard bit is learning how to do anything. The Pills teach you how the language and "runtime" works, but nixpkgs is gargantuan and requires a whole lot of extra learning, as is home-manager, as is nix-darwin.
deleted 5y ago
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Fight through it for another couple of weekends - the Stockholm syndrome feels sooo gooooood! I found it much more helpful to find people's own Nix setups and learn from them, by the way. Mine is at https://github.com/Smaug123/nix-dotfiles https://github.com/Smaug123/nix-dotfiles - like all such things, it's a WIP, and I'm definitely still a noob, but bits of it may be able to help.

Majestic121 5y ago

Your honesty is refreshing. I've seen countless people trying a new technology/tool, and overselling it as 'amazing' and super easy. Seeing a post like yours helps to keep the discussion grounded in reality, with tools that looks nice on paper but have practical downsides as well.

abathur 5y ago
I agree with this general sentiment, but I'll add that it's worth reading most posts about Nix through this lens. Finding your sea legs is rough, and IME people who completely deny this are few and far between. The reward is a pretty impressive lever.
- ronenlh 5y ago
  The thing I use and like most in nix is nix-shell. I set up a shell.nix file on my projects, and together with direnv the environment switches with the right dependencies for each project. Shameless plug, I wrote about this recently on medium: https://link.medium.com/cYkKMtdHRkb https://link.medium.com/cYkKMtdHRkb
pxc 5y ago
Nix IS amazing. It is NOT super easy. Parts of it are getting easier, and it has an exceptionally smart and helpful community. But it's not smooth and pretty and easy to pick up like Homebrew is. (And that does suck)

peterhil 5y ago

Nox is much easier interface to nix. I often use that instead of nix-env.

ghostwriter 5y ago

you can search via web interface - https://search.nixos.org/packages?channel=nixpkgs-unstable https://search.nixos.org/packages?channel=nixpkgs-unstable

Smaug123 5y ago
Finding packages is not the hard bit :P the hard bit is learning how to do anything. The Pills teach you how the language and "runtime" works, but nixpkgs is gargantuan and requires a whole lot of extra learning, as is home-manager, as is nix-darwin.

deleted 5y ago

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