nix-darwin VS repology-rules

Just a shout out to nix-darwin[1]. It is nix, so initial setup is a bit involved. But then it truly makes it easy to configure everything in one place including mac defaults, homebrew apps declaratively and mas apps etc.

There is a sample config in nix-darwin repo[2].

[1] https://github.com/LnL7/nix-darwin

[2] https://github.com/LnL7/nix-darwin/blob/master/modules/examp...

https://github.com/LnL7/nix-darwin/tree/master/modules

nix-darwin does similar thing for MacOS

You can use https://github.com/LnL7/nix-darwin

There are many threads around where you can learn more about this (and why it's complicated...), but https://github.com/nix-community/home-manager/issues/1341 and https://github.com/LnL7/nix-darwin/issues/139 seem like two of the most comprehensive.

Nix is pretty usable for both desktops and headless servers. Personally, I even use it on macOS without much trouble.

My system looks like any other install of Ventura, but all of my configuration, ranging from the terminal and VS Code to macOS-specific system preferences and Safari, is done declaratively in Nix [1]. The overwhelming majority of my installed software also comes from Nix packages, with some exceptions for stuff that is not packaged yet (e.g., I have Podman Desktop, the macOS ZFS port, Lulu, yubikey-manager-qt installed through Homebrew -- fortunately nix-darwin [2] also just lets me have an set of brews/casks in my config).

It was been a bit of a nightmare at first since the error messages are kind of horrific, and there can be a lack of good examples/docs on flakes. But I think the weekend worth of time I invested was worth it since I no longer need to rely on hacky shellscripts or remember to manually configure anything.

[1]: <https://github.com/nix-community/home-manager>

[2]: <https://github.com/LnL7/nix-darwin>

Take a look at nix-darwin, this is what I use. It allows you to configure your system similar to NixOS including globally installed programs.

This — I still use mas and brew —-cask through the nix-darwin module, though. It’s not exactly reproducible, but it’s at least closer to reproducible and declarative.

A lot, it's (also) a complete linux distribution. See https://guix.gnu.org/en/packages/ and for comparison with other distros: https://repology.org/ It looks like they entered the top ten since last time I checked.

I'm having a hard time believing it, but apparently nixpkgs is larger than AUR per https://repology.org/?

Generally, the easiest thing to do is to do nothing - if your software is useful and people are using it, then packagers will show up. You can track what distros packaged your project on https://repology.org/.

I remember when the internet was smaller (20 years ago?) some people would have a comparison of different package managers for linux distros where they would dive in to examples and use. Anyway, this is a high level of package currency : https://repology.org/

The last distros I've used that didn't really have their own package managers were Slackware (it is just a tarball) and PuppyLinux (adopted from slackware or debian).

Anyway, Slitaz is here https://repology.org/repository/slitaz_cooking

You can basically install nix packages on every Linux and even MacOS. They are imo better developed and less error prone. You are guaranteed to never have dependency issues. The hashing scheme and idea of representing and building packages from derivation logic is spectacular design. The design of Nix inherently supports atomic upgrades and the likes of an immutable system. Also, afaik, it has the largest package availability currently (at least as many pkgs as Arch's) https://repology.org/

Yep, it's no. 1 on https://repology.org/

Most have it on their website, but you can also check here