8 ms·

Nix Home Manager Option Search

35 points by mipselaer 3y ago

mipselaer 3y ago
When you like Home Manager but don't like reading long manuals.
__MatrixMan__ 3y ago
Is there a good way of getting this sort of thing for nix projects in general? I often find myself cloning the repo for it just so I can grep for `mkOption` and I often wonder if there's a smarter way.
- presto8 3y ago
  man configuration.nix Then use the search function of the pager.
  - pimeys 3y ago
    man home-configuration.nix works for home-manager
- hiimshort 3y ago
  I only got it to the proof of concept stage, but I was hacking on something that would generate docs for everything found on a Nix Flake (including modules): https://github.com/snowfallorg/frost https://github.com/snowfallorg/frost Here's an example output that I generated for my config repo: https://jakehamilton.github.io/config/ https://jakehamilton.github.io/config/
- viraptor 3y ago
  Some services have a very heavy meta description. I can't think of one for home-manager right now, but in nixos caddy config is not easy to read from source.
- soraminazuki 3y ago
  Don't projects using Nix modules typically list all the available options in their documentation? For example, https://nix-community.github.io/home-manager/options.xhtml https://nix-community.github.io/home-manager/options.xhtml I find it good practice to actually read the modules though. So personally, I think grepping is fine.
asheko 3y ago
Hi
- lom 3y ago
  sup?
HappyAndHarmles 3y ago
On a related note, if anybody would like to get started with home-manager, we have a flake template for it: https://github.com/juspay/nix-dev-home https://github.com/juspay/nix-dev-home
jmnicolas 3y ago
I "love" these projects that won't even describe what they do on their front page or even in their manual. Of course everybody has 30 minutes to spare to try to understand what it is.
- drakerossman 3y ago
  Fear not, these are configuration options for a project called Home Manager, which manages your user configuration and dotfiles with the help of Nix the package manager: https://drakerossman.com/blog/how-to-add-home-manager-to-nixos https://drakerossman.com/blog/how-to-add-home-manager-to-nix...
- hiimshort 3y ago
  Home-Manager is a project that brings declarative user home directory management to Nix. You can have it set up dotfiles, user systemd services, etc. All the things to do with stuff in your home directory. The documentation for Home-Manager that is generated is an extremely large html file with every option listed. It is not easy to read or discover options in. The linked tool provides a search field to query the available options for Home-Manager, making it much easier to digest. This is similar to the NixOS Options search tool which does the same job of providing search for NixOS options.
  - jmnicolas 3y ago
    Thanks, I thought it was some kind of home (house) automation. Do you have an example of what it's useful for? Why would I "manage" my home directory?
    - hiimshort 3y ago
      Declarative home environments are pretty great. Being able to reproduce your entire user setup is fantastic when you manage multiple machines or want to make future migrations. I run NixOS and use Home-Manager as well. This lets me define my entire system in addition to my user home contents declaratively. So with this configuration I can apply NixOS & Home-Manager to get the same results anywhere. Here is an example of my Home-Manager configuration: https://github.com/jakehamilton/config/blob/a3da20eeab74a50ab2a97a6743c2f22caf668dd9/modules/home/tools/git/default.nix#L21 https://github.com/jakehamilton/config/blob/a3da20eeab74a50a... In this example I configure Git. This gets written to my user home's config directory.
gedanziger 3y ago
I love nix and use it for my configs and builds at work, but it is definitely hard to get going compared to other tools. I appreciate what you did going through and making some good docs, bookmarked!
Bnichs 3y ago
This is a good example of how nix is both a) far to complicated a tool chain and b) completely underdocumented for how complicated it is. I swear until I ripped nix off my systems, every time I had to do anything, even a simple home manager update, something would break in an unexplainable way and id have to dig for hours to figure it out, sometimes to no avail like with their libc libraries that end up breaking system compatability with no workaround. Given that, this could be good for Home manager because the more they can improve documentation and disassociate their good product with the rats mess of an ecosystem it lives on, the better.
- gipp 3y ago
  That's.... so strangely diametrically opposite to my experience with Nix. The language itself leaves some things to be desired, and of course no argument on the documentation, but as a build and packaging system I have never in my life experienced fewer headaches. Everything Just Works, every time. Granted, this is on a NixOS system -- I imagine trying to jam a standalone Home Manager install on top of a non-Nixos system is a rather different situation.
  - Bnichs 3y ago
    I think that's part of the problem. It seems like the only way to have a good nix experience is to go all in with NixOS. The problem is that is a huge sell for someone who already has an OS they like and the fact that testing out nix standalone is such a pain means you end up with very little confidence in the prospect of migrating everything over. Plus, at least when I considered NixOS a few years ago, the setup instructions seemed not well ironed out and made me really hesitant that it wouldn't brick my system. All in all I think nix falls into the category of great idea in theory, but the implementation is so lacking in ergonomics and ease of use that I don't see how it could be anything other than a niche build system without major UX updates.
    - earthling8118 3y ago
      In my experience this isn't true. I use NixOS because it is my preferred OS due to ease of setup and ergonomics. When I have no choice but to use a different OS the tooling is still there for me to use and it works fine. It's the other package managers that I worry about.

35 points by mipselaer 3y ago

When you like Home Manager but don't like reading long manuals.

Is there a good way of getting this sort of thing for nix projects in general? I often find myself cloning the repo for it just so I can grep for `mkOption` and I often wonder if there's a smarter way.

presto8 3y ago
man configuration.nix Then use the search function of the pager.
- pimeys 3y ago
  man home-configuration.nix works for home-manager
hiimshort 3y ago
I only got it to the proof of concept stage, but I was hacking on something that would generate docs for everything found on a Nix Flake (including modules): https://github.com/snowfallorg/frost https://github.com/snowfallorg/frost Here's an example output that I generated for my config repo: https://jakehamilton.github.io/config/ https://jakehamilton.github.io/config/
viraptor 3y ago
Some services have a very heavy meta description. I can't think of one for home-manager right now, but in nixos caddy config is not easy to read from source.
soraminazuki 3y ago
Don't projects using Nix modules typically list all the available options in their documentation? For example, https://nix-community.github.io/home-manager/options.xhtml https://nix-community.github.io/home-manager/options.xhtml I find it good practice to actually read the modules though. So personally, I think grepping is fine.

asheko 3y ago

lom 3y ago
sup?

HappyAndHarmles 3y ago

On a related note, if anybody would like to get started with home-manager, we have a flake template for it: https://github.com/juspay/nix-dev-home https://github.com/juspay/nix-dev-home

jmnicolas 3y ago

I "love" these projects that won't even describe what they do on their front page or even in their manual. Of course everybody has 30 minutes to spare to try to understand what it is.

drakerossman 3y ago
Fear not, these are configuration options for a project called Home Manager, which manages your user configuration and dotfiles with the help of Nix the package manager: https://drakerossman.com/blog/how-to-add-home-manager-to-nixos https://drakerossman.com/blog/how-to-add-home-manager-to-nix...
hiimshort 3y ago
Home-Manager is a project that brings declarative user home directory management to Nix. You can have it set up dotfiles, user systemd services, etc. All the things to do with stuff in your home directory. The documentation for Home-Manager that is generated is an extremely large html file with every option listed. It is not easy to read or discover options in. The linked tool provides a search field to query the available options for Home-Manager, making it much easier to digest. This is similar to the NixOS Options search tool which does the same job of providing search for NixOS options.
- jmnicolas 3y ago
  Thanks, I thought it was some kind of home (house) automation. Do you have an example of what it's useful for? Why would I "manage" my home directory?
  - hiimshort 3y ago
    Declarative home environments are pretty great. Being able to reproduce your entire user setup is fantastic when you manage multiple machines or want to make future migrations. I run NixOS and use Home-Manager as well. This lets me define my entire system in addition to my user home contents declaratively. So with this configuration I can apply NixOS & Home-Manager to get the same results anywhere. Here is an example of my Home-Manager configuration: https://github.com/jakehamilton/config/blob/a3da20eeab74a50ab2a97a6743c2f22caf668dd9/modules/home/tools/git/default.nix#L21 https://github.com/jakehamilton/config/blob/a3da20eeab74a50a... In this example I configure Git. This gets written to my user home's config directory.

gedanziger 3y ago

I love nix and use it for my configs and builds at work, but it is definitely hard to get going compared to other tools. I appreciate what you did going through and making some good docs, bookmarked!

Bnichs 3y ago

This is a good example of how nix is both a) far to complicated a tool chain and b) completely underdocumented for how complicated it is. I swear until I ripped nix off my systems, every time I had to do anything, even a simple home manager update, something would break in an unexplainable way and id have to dig for hours to figure it out, sometimes to no avail like with their libc libraries that end up breaking system compatability with no workaround. Given that, this could be good for Home manager because the more they can improve documentation and disassociate their good product with the rats mess of an ecosystem it lives on, the better.

gipp 3y ago
That's.... so strangely diametrically opposite to my experience with Nix. The language itself leaves some things to be desired, and of course no argument on the documentation, but as a build and packaging system I have never in my life experienced fewer headaches. Everything Just Works, every time. Granted, this is on a NixOS system -- I imagine trying to jam a standalone Home Manager install on top of a non-Nixos system is a rather different situation.
- Bnichs 3y ago
  I think that's part of the problem. It seems like the only way to have a good nix experience is to go all in with NixOS. The problem is that is a huge sell for someone who already has an OS they like and the fact that testing out nix standalone is such a pain means you end up with very little confidence in the prospect of migrating everything over. Plus, at least when I considered NixOS a few years ago, the setup instructions seemed not well ironed out and made me really hesitant that it wouldn't brick my system. All in all I think nix falls into the category of great idea in theory, but the implementation is so lacking in ergonomics and ease of use that I don't see how it could be anything other than a niche build system without major UX updates.
  - earthling8118 3y ago
    In my experience this isn't true. I use NixOS because it is my preferred OS due to ease of setup and ergonomics. When I have no choice but to use a different OS the tooling is still there for me to use and it works fine. It's the other package managers that I worry about.