> We have a private repo with pre-compiled binaries, and a simple Homebrew formula that downloads the utilities and installs them. Perfectly doable with Nix. I

> We have a private repo with pre-compiled binaries, and a simple Homebrew formula that downloads the utilities and installs them. Perfectly doable with Nix. Ignore the purists and do the hackiest way that works. It's too bad that tutorials get lost on concepts (which are useful to know but a real turn down) instead of focusing on some hands-on practical how-to. This should about do it and is really not that different nor difficult than formulas or brew install: git init mychannel cd mychannel cat > default.nix <<'NIX' { pkgs ? import <nixpkgs> { }, }: { foo = pkgs.callPackage ./pkgs/foo { }; } NIX mkdir -p pkgs/foo cat > pkgs/foo/default.nix <<'NIX' { pkgs, stdenv, lib }: stdenv.mkDerivation { pname = "foo"; version = "1.0"; # if you have something to fetch # src = fetchurl { # url = http://example.org/foo-1.2.3.tar.bz2; # # if you don't know the hash, put some lib.fakeSha256 there # sha256 = "0x2g1jqygyr5wiwg4ma1nd7w4ydpy82z9gkcv8vh2v8dn3y58v5m"; # }; buildInputs = [ # add any deps ]; # this example just builds in place, so skip unpack unpackPhase = "true"; # no src attribute # optional if you just want to copy from your source above # build trivial example script in place buildPhase = '' cat > foo <<'SHELL' #!/bin/bash echo 'foo!' SHELL chmod +x foo ''; # just copy whatever installPhase = '' mkdir -p $out/bin cp foo $out/bin ''; } NIX nix-build -A foo -o out/foo # you should have your build in '/out/foo' ./out/foo/bin/foo # => foo! git add . git commit -a -m 'init channel' git add origin git@github.com:OWNER/mychannel git push origin main nix-channel --add https://github.com/OWNER/mychannel/archive/main.tar.gz mychannel nix-channel --update nix-env -iA mychannel.foo foo # => foo! (I just cobbled that up together, if it doesn't work as is it's damn close; flakes left as an exercise to the reader) Note: if it's a private repo then in /etc/nix/netrc (or ~/.config/nix/netrc for single user installs): machine github.com password ghp_YOurToKEn > Compiling the binaries requires quite a few tools (C++, sigh). Instantly sounds like a whole reason to use nix and capture those tools as part of the dependency set.