NIX - The Package Manager

You might know NIX as the Linux OS. What we will see, is that we can actually use the NIX Package Manager for any other Linux (and even mac).

Nix Package Manager

Nix package manager is a powerful and flexible package manager for Linux and other Unix-like operating systems. It is known for its declarative approach to package management, which allows users to specify the desired state of their system and have the package manager handle the installation and management of dependencies.

Installing NIX

Manage your system dependencies in a more declarative and efficient way. Let’s get started with Nix installation on Debian, you can follow these steps:

Debian Based

curl -L https://nixos.org/nix/install | sh
#sudo bash ./nix-*-multi-user.sh

Check the installed version with: nix-env –version

Arch Based

sudo pacman -S base-devel
sudo pacman -S yay
yay -S nix

One for All Steps

Activate Nix common steps again, by adding the following lines to your shell profile (e.g., ~/.bashrc):

. /etc/profile.d/nix.sh
#. /home/orangepi/.nix-profile/etc/profile.d/nix.sh

Reload your shell profile:

source ~/.bashrc

Using NIX

Once Nix is installed, you can use it to install packages by running the nix-env command.

• For example, to install the git package, you can run:

nix-env -i git

• Or to install the Julia language:

#nix-shell -p julia #in nix shell only

nix-env -iA nixpkgs.julia
julia --version

Finding Packages

• NIX Site

You can start by looking at https://search.nixos.org/packages

• Locally

You can use the nix-env command to search for packages on your local system. For example, to search for packages related to the python programming language, you can run:

nix-env -qa python

FAQ

Ephimeral Environments

Nix Ephimeral Shell Enviroments - video