I think it’s very impressive how NixOS seems to have better UX (easiest distro to use) than any distro I have ever tried despite all the horrible UX issues (Nix is a very bad language, lack of documentation etc.). All because immutability, declarativity and system configuration being just setting an option is so big of a win. And I don’t even know Nix lang.
The community is working hard on that topic, while also trying to prioritize what's the most critical aspects for folks. Anything that sticks out the most for you?
The insanely steep learning curve, for something that manages packages. Nix will never take off until you ditch the DSL and get documentation in shape. Otherwise Nix will continue being a system developed by very smart engineers for very smart engineers.
I think the UX problems with Nix are well documented and understood. The developers behind it just need to focus. For that focus to take place, the project needs to be placed under better stewardship.
nix is a build tool, not a package manager. Misunderstanding nix as a package manager (and the dumb marketing on its website) is what leads to frustration (along with, of course, docs).
Don’t forget the documentation! “getting started” bugs that outright breaks your install if you actually try to follow them; WONTFIX, you should just know how to do it.
I've seen you post about this before, I think, and I am curious about the details. How did you install Nix and what were the sections of the manual that broke things for you?
Last time I checked (~year ago) this wordage was still on the documentation page; someone seems to have hit in January. It seems to be missing now though.
Six years with a basic “run this and your path through the documentation stops” issue IMO is a project not worth my time; they clearly don’t want new users.
Yeah this is a documentation footgun for some¹ users, and unfortunately is more likely to hit new users and dabblers than the experienced or dedicated Nix users who can just step over it. It sucks.
It's true that the information in that section² of the manual is correct, and also true that those snippets are not instructions, so the manual is not instructing anyone to do a thing that will break their computer... but if some Nix profile is the only thing putting Nix on your PATH and you switch away from that profile, you will naturally no longer have Nix on your PATH, and the next Nix command you try to run will fail. The docs should warn you about that in this section, and the application should also warn you on any actions that might leave your PATH Nixless like this.
There's another problem here, I think only hinted at in that GitHub issue, in that if you switch to an empty or nonexistent profile and start a new shell, the `/bin` path in your profile won't be added to your shell's PATH on shell startup because it doesn't exist. And then when you do install something to that profile, it won't be on your PATH until you start a new shell.
The issue you filed should be reopened as a documentation bug, and a new issue should be created about warning users on operations that might render their PATHs Nixless.
If anyone does hit this or something similar: you can just run nix-env or any other Nix binaries directly from the Nix store, or from one of the other still-existing profile links under /nix/var/nix/profiles, e.g. /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/$USER/bin/nix-env, to switch your profile back.
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1: Namely, Nix users whose Nix binaries are provided in a per-user profile and are running Nix as the relevant users. NixOS users, Nix-Darwin users, System Manager users, users of regular old multi-user Nix installs, and users who install Nix itself via their distro's package manager aren't affected.
