Install from NixOS channel

[matthew-piziak]

Strange that I have to install lorri with nix-env instead of just tossing it in my configuration file as environment.systemPackages = [ lorri ];. Is there going to be an upstream package in the future?

I tried making my own like this:

{ config, pkgs, ... }:

let
  lorri = pkgs.stdenv.mkDerivation rec {
    pname = "lorri";
    version = "rolling-release";
    src = pkgs.fetchFromGitHub {
      owner = "target";
      repo = "lorri";
      rev = "094a903d19eb652a79ad6e7db6ad1ee9ad78d26c";
      sha256 = "11i4kbwclwyvznyd9q69fq36fjasvs72ziz0555hl3fjbbq0n72q";
    };
  };
in
{
  environment.systemPackages = [ lorri ];
}

But it failed like this:

shkhgcxs3aljqz771rilj8c-nixpkgs-18.09.2436.395a543f360/nixpkgs/pkgs/stdenv/generic/make-derivation.nix:177:11:
while evaluating the attribute 'system.activationScripts.script' at /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels/nixpkgs/nixos/modules/system/activation/activation-script.nix:67:9:
while evaluating 'textClosureMap' at /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels/nixpkgs/lib/strings-with-deps.nix:70:35, called from /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels/nixpkgs/nixos/modules/system/activation/activation-script.nix:88:18:
while evaluating 'id' at /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels/nixpkgs/lib/trivial.nix:14:5, called from undefined position:
while evaluating the attribute 'text' at /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels/nixpkgs/nixos/modules/system/activation/activation-script.nix:9:5:
while evaluating the attribute 'text' at /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels/nixpkgs/lib/strings-with-deps.nix:77:38:
while evaluating the attribute 'sources' of the derivation 'etc' at /nix/store/yn6df0qzkshkhgcxs3aljqz771rilj8c-nixpkgs-18.09.2436.395a543f360/nixpkgs/pkgs/stdenv/generic/make-derivation.nix:177:11:
while evaluating anonymous function at /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels/nixpkgs/nixos/modules/system/etc/etc.nix:20:20, called from undefined position:
while evaluating the attribute 'source' at undefined position:
while evaluating anonymous function at /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels/nixpkgs/lib/modules.nix:75:45, called from undefined position:
while evaluating the attribute 'value' at /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels/nixpkgs/lib/modules.nix:336:9:
while evaluating the option `environment.etc.crontab.source':
while evaluating the attribute 'mergedValue' at /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels/nixpkgs/lib/modules.nix:369:5:
while evaluating anonymous function at /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels/nixpkgs/lib/modules.nix:369:32, called from /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels/nixpkgs/lib/modules.nix:369:19:
while evaluating 'check' at /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels/nixpkgs/lib/types.nix:240:15, called from /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels/nixpkgs/lib/modules.nix:370:10:
while evaluating the attribute 'allFiles' of the derivation 'crontabs' at /nix/store/yn6df0qzkshkhgcxs3aljqz771rilj8c-nixpkgs-18.09.2436.395a543f360/nixpkgs/pkgs/stdenv/generic/make-derivation.nix:177:11:
while evaluating the attribute 'text' of the derivation 'system-crontab' at /nix/store/yn6df0qzkshkhgcxs3aljqz771rilj8c-nixpkgs-18.09.2436.395a543f360/nixpkgs/pkgs/stdenv/generic/make-derivation.nix:177:11:
while evaluating the attribute 'passAsFile' of the derivation 'system-path' at /nix/store/yn6df0qzkshkhgcxs3aljqz771rilj8c-nixpkgs-18.09.2436.395a543f360/nixpkgs/pkgs/stdenv/generic/make-derivation.nix:177:11:
illegal name: '.drv'

[sveitser]

I installed it with with the following overlay

~/.config/nixpkgs/overlays/lorri.nix:

self: super: {
  lorri =
    let src =
      (super.fetchFromGitHub {
        owner = "target";
        repo = "lorri";
        rev = "e943fa403234f1a5e403b6fdc112e79abc1e29ba";
        sha256 = "1ar7clza117qdzldld9qzg4q0wr3g20zxrnd1s51cg6gxwlpg7fa";
      });
    in super.callPackage src { inherit src; };
}

[Profpatsch]

For now we are on a rolling-release schedule via lorri self-upgrade, which is a small wrapper around nix-env (see https://github.com/target/lorri#upgrading). We’ll migrate to semver (and push it to nixpkgs) once we stabilize the interface and functionality, but we want to be able to make fast iterations for now.

[matthew-piziak]

@sveitser Your solution looks good! But after I home-manager switch no lorri executable appears. How do I get home-manager to recognize the overlay?

[sveitser]

@matthew-piziak I thought overlays put into ~/.config/nixpkgs/overlays would be applied automatically but that doesn't seem to be the case.

I think this should work in configuration.nix or home.nix.

nixpkgs.overlays = [
  (import ./path/to/lorri.nix) 
];

[matthew-piziak]

Aw, I tried that too, with a fully qualified path as well. No dice. 😢 😕

[sveitser]

Hmm. Did you add lorri to home.packages ?

[matthew-piziak]

Yeah, I added pkgs = import <nixpkgs> and home.packages = [ pkgs.lorri ];

[sveitser]

What if you apply the overlay in configuration.nix and add lorri to environment.systemPackages ?

I'm using this

https://github.com/sveitser/nixconfig/blob/master/pc-common.nix#L20
https://github.com/sveitser/nixconfig/blob/master/home-nixpkgs/home.nix#L26
https://github.com/sveitser/nixpkgs-overlays/blob/71fd604a7ed4bb0c0f260c1fa6d3dd7f73e17ab1/lorri.nix

[matthew-piziak]

That did it! Yes! Thank you for bearing with me. :)

Now it's failing with a cargo error, but that's something I can take look into myself. I'm just happy my configuration is picking it up.