tack

flake-like toml nix pins, lazily fetched and transformed

maintains pins.toml (what you want) and pins.lock.json (what's fetched), plus an inputs.nix resolver to consume locked inputs without nix's flake machinery

layout

tack init writes three files to the current dir (or $TACK_DIR)

• pins.toml inputs and shorturl schemes, hand-editable
• pins.lock.json resolved inputs, written by tack update, read by nix
• inputs.nix the resolver; import ./inputs.nix gives a name -> input attrset

flake-free config

let inputs = import ./inputs.nix;
in inputs.nixpkgs.legacyPackages.x86_64-linux.hello

or a flake

outputs = { self }:
  let inputs = import ./inputs.nix; in {
    packages.x86_64-linux.default =
      inputs.nixpkgs.legacyPackages.x86_64-linux.hello;
  };

commands

tack init [--force]
tack update [names...]   fetch latest, rewrite lock
tack look [names...]     report pins with newer upstream revs
tack add <name> <url> [--no-flake] [--dir <d>] [--submodules] [--follows c=p]...
tack rm <name>
tack alias <name> <template>   define a shorturl scheme
tack alias --rm <name>         remove one

url schemes

• github:owner/repo[/ref] tarball via codeload
• git+https://... / git+ssh://... any git remote; ?ref=<branch> / ?rev=<sha> to pin, submodules = true to recurse
• https://... / http://... raw tarball, where the format is inferred from the extension (e.g. .tar, .tar.gz/.tgz, .tar.xz/.txz).

shorturls

scheme:rest expands by substituting rest into the template {path}

[shorturls]
gh = "github:{path}"

[inputs.coolproject]
url = "gh:owner/coolproject"

follows

point a pin's input at one of your top-level pins instead of its own lock

[inputs.foo]
url = "gh:owner/foo"
follows = { nixpkgs = "nixpkgs" }   # foo's nixpkgs -> your nixpkgs pin

all_follow applies a rule to every pin that has a matching input

[all_follow]
nixpkgs = "nixpkgs"   # every input named nixpkgs follows your nixpkgs pin

[inputs.bar]
url = "gh:owner/bar"
exclude_follow = ["nixpkgs"]   # ...except bar's

build

nix develop   # rust toolchain + openssl/libgit2
nix build     # the binary

license

EUPL-1.2. see LICENSE