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So is it like “Nix isn’t free (as in RMS) enough?” Is it like Devuan to Debian? Is it like GNU Herd to Linux? (Surely not since it’s Linux ;))

• davexunit 3y ago
  No it's not like that all. Free software is a component of it, but Guix is not a fork. It's a completely separate implementation of the functional package management model with many significant differences and advancements. It uses Scheme, a general purpose and extensible programming language, rather than a custom DSL like Nix. Scheme is used for build scripts as well and a lot of code can be shared between the host and build containers. Nix uses Bash. Having one language unifying all the layers makes it easier to hack on the entire stack. Guix has a stronger focus on reproducible and bootstrappable builds and is making notable advancements on the "software supply chain" security problem. OS service configuration is done through a graph extension system whereas Nix uses something more like a flat hash of config values. I could go on but I hope this makes the point that Guix isn't just taking Nix and removing proprietary stuff. It's its own thing.
• rekado 3y ago
  > Is it like GNU Herd to Linux? (Surely not since it’s Linux ;)) You actually can use the Hurd as a kernel with Guix System. Or run a Hurd VM on your Linux-based Guix System with the childhurd.