NixOS-WSL VS digga

I have not used it but this might be what you are looking for: https://github.com/nix-community/NixOS-WSL

You could also install the nix package manager on Ubuntu.

This project began as I didn't like that NixOS-WSL used systemd in the background, so I made this for myself. Some of the advantages: faster boot time, smaller image size and a FHS distro in the background, that lets you load dynamically linked binaries (for example, to have VSCode remote working OOTB).

There's a community port of NixOS to WSL2, complete with systemd support, plus Docker Desktop support and some other goodies: https://github.com/nix-community/NixOS-WSL

Nix also works on other WSL distros, provided they're using WSL2.

Nix supports cross-compiling Windows binaries as well. I know some people use it for that.

There is no 'native' support— you can't use Nix as an alternative to Winget or Chocolatey on Windows. Right now a lot of important stuff in Nixpkgs depends on a POSIX shell and Unix coreutils implementation for the basic build environment, and that's shared between many operating systems. Trying to fit Windows into that doesn't really make s sense, and there's not really any momentum behind the idea of using any particular other runtime environment (could be a scripting language instead of a shell + coreutils) for those basic builders.

But it's conceivable that some day, one or more companies using Nix on WSL might see vaiue in taking that extra step and put together a Nix-based package collection for Windows and help get the Nix Windows port out the door.

Basically, I managed to get NixOS inside WSL2 by using this: https://github.com/Trundle/NixOS-WSL

But whenever I try running code . with nixos-wsl(https://github.com/Trundle/NixOS-WSL), the error: `code: command not found` is thrown, also, whenever I try to open nixos-wsl from vscode, it does not work and the terminal throws a bunch of errors?

This one issue may clear things up, seems like my config is a little outdated: https://github.com/divnix/digga/pull/385

I'm new to the Nix world, but so far I've come across Divnix's Digga, Numtide's DevShell, and Misterio77's nix-starter-configs.

There are config templates / configuration helper libraries that try to make this easier, for example digga/devos.

https://nixos.wiki/wiki/Flakes, especially the “see also” section. If you’re looking to use for NixOS config across multiple hosts, digga (see the repo for example template) is pretty nice for encapsulating a lot of boilerplate.

The digga library, while being more complex to use than other solutions here, got a pretty elegant solution for it merged a few weeks ago. Still some cracks that are getting smoothed over, but it seems to work.

I like the concept digga/devos uses (unfortunately their stuff kind of is an overengineered incomprehensible mess): They use: - modules: for modules like in nixpkgs (i.e. stuff that defines options and generates configuration based on that options; are included into every host) - profiles: concrete configuration, can be included to host definitions - suites: sets of profiles (so you can for example have a desktop suite with all your profiles with "desktop" configuration options and apply that to all your desktop computers)

For the system, I like the devos template:

https://github.com/divnix/devos

The idea of flakes is how you define inputs, and you define the system (and packages, and shell etc.) in the outputs using the inputs. The inputs are git repos which point to other flakes. You can mix and match these as much as you want (see the devos repo for examples) and when you build the derivation, it generates a lockfile for exact commits in that point in time what were used in the given inputs.

You commit the lockfile and in the other systems where you pull your config from the repo, it uses exactly those commits and installs the same versions as you did in your other systems.

This was quite annoying and hard to do before flakes. Now it's easy.

The problem what people face with building their system as a flake is combining the packages so you can point to `jq` from the unstable nixos and firefox from the stable train. I think this aspect needs better documentation so it wouldn't be so damn hard to learn (believe me, I know). Luckily there are projects like devos that give a nice template for people to play with (with documentation!)

Another use for flakes is to create a development shell for your repo, an example what I did a while ago:

https://github.com/pimeys/nix-prisma-example

Either have `nix-direnv` installed, enter the directory and say `direnv allow`, or just `nix develop` and it will gather, compile and install the correct versions of packages to your shell. Updating the packages? Call `nix flake update` in the directory, commit the lockfile and everybody else gets the new versions to their shell.

Yes, I put the repository in ~/nix. My repository is based on devos, but I am thinking of switching to a different setup, because I don't want to depend on a framework which can be an issue in updating.

I no longer use the official way since I have switched to flakes. I am currently using a devos-based config, which is a boilerplate that depends on a Nix toolchain, but I plan on rewriting the config with flake-utils-plus. You probably can install home-manager using deploy-rs. See the following comment: