kustomizer VS luet

I spent some time with the Depot Lite paper, and it's wild how much much there are little hints (less strict) of many of the exact principles the are used in Nix. Turning software installations read-only after a few weeks was one that stuck out the most, along with the basic FHS adjustments.

I've read through a few if the Nix papers before, but they're probably worth revisiting by now after using Nix for a few years and experimenting with Guix a bit.

> I can geek out about package management all day.

Same! I've been fascinated with package management probably since I was about 12 or 13, when I first tried desktop Linux. Package managers are incredibly powerful systems tackling an equally incredibly tough problem space. Multi-language package managers (i.e., ports systems and Linux distro package managers have always especially impressed me. (Imo even the 'bad' Linux distro package managers are pretty good, as much as I can be harsh on them in certain aspects when comparing them.)

Getting into Nix has made me think more deeply about the designs of the many language-specific package managers, since each one needs/gets a different treatment in Nixpkgs according to its unique properties. It's similarly provided an illuminating alternative to the container approach to traditional deployment troubles— one that conserves more of what is good about the traditional package management paradigms on Linux and elsewhere.

Have you looked at Michael Stapelberg's work on package management? I think it's the most exciting work on package management outside the Nix and Guix worlds: https://michael.stapelberg.ch/posts/2019-08-17-introducing-d...

Luet also looks interesting, but I've not really played with it yet. Its approach seems to be to add more package-like granularity to existing container systems: https://github.com/mudler/luet