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-author = "Kumar Damani"
-title = "Adventures in NixOS - Part 1"
-date = "2023-03-24"
-draft = false
-description = "Guide to getting started with NixOS the modern way."
-tags = [
-    "technology"
-]
-+++
-
-Almost a guide to getting started with NixOS the modern (2023) way.
-<!--more-->
-
-There seems to be a shortage of written guides on the Internet for setting up NixOS
-the "modern" way - Flakes + Home Manager. It doesn't help that Nix's official
-docs are very disjointed so hopefully this will fill in some gaps that I observed 
-when setting it all up.
-
-![meme](fox.jpg)
-
-> Warning: NixOS is not exactly beginner friendly - 
-you should have familiarity installing Linux distros before trying this.
-
-## But Why NixOS?
-Eh... FOMO regarding all the [memes](https://www.google.com/search?q=nixos+memes&tbm=isch).
-
-There is one particular feature that is intriguing -
-the ability to roll-back your entire system (not incl. BIOS) in case of a 
-misconfiguration or a broken update. **You can't do this with Ansible.**
-This allows you (in theory) to get the benefits of a rolling release as well as the
-stability benefits of a traditional distro.
-
-> It takes the idea of reproducible builds, and extends it to the OS.
-
-For example, NixOS will present you with all previous "builds" at boot time 
-for you to revert to in case something gets messed up.
-![boot prompt](boot.png)
-
-## Things I want to explore as part of this exercise:
-1. How hard is it to go from a minimal install to productive?
-At minimum I need a graphical environment with working vol, mic, camera, wifi, 
-and hibernation. 
-Is it harder than doing the same in something like Manjaro?
-2. Is Wayland truly ready?
-3. Try out [`dwl`](https://github.com/djpohly/dwl) (the Wayland port of `dwm` by the [suckless](https://suckless.org) folks) 
-
-## Constraints
-1. I want to stick to the "Nix" way of doing things as much as possible
-*where it makes sense to me*.
-2. Stick to Wayland only applications as much as possible.
-
-## Spoilers! (End result)
-![my rice](rice.png)
-(Probably too ugly for r/unixporn, but works for me :)
-
-## Installation
-### Getting a Live USB going
-* I used the [minimal iso](https://nixos.org/download.html#nixos-iso).
-* Create a bootable USB with the usual - `sudo dd if=/path/to/iso of=/dev/sdX bs=4M`.
-* Boot up. 
-* Then start following the steps for [manual installation](https://nixos.org/manual/nixos/stable/index.html#sec-installation-manual)
-from the official guide to complete the install.
-
-> Make sure to give SWAP as much space as your memory capacity for hibernation to work properly.
-
-> Wifi did not work for me out of the box. So I used my phone to tether via USB. 
-
-## First boot
-If everything went well, you should be presented with a TTY prompting you to login:
-```
-NixOS ...
-Login: <your username>
-Password: <your password>
-```
-Once you login, you will still just have a TTY, but we can now go ahead and start
-installing our graphical environment. 
-
-## Housekeeping
-* You should have two NixOS config files in `/etc/nixos/`:
-```
-configuration.nix
-hardware-configuration.nix
-```
-
-* Edit the `configuration.nix` file by setting the correct values for hostname, networking, timezone and users. I also add a few basic system-wide packages here such as `git, rsync, neovim, htop` etc.
-
-* To *apply and use* your changes to any of these files you need to run:
-```bash
-sudo nixos-rebuild switch
-```
-* Since we want all our configuration to be version controlled,
-I copied these files to live under my user's config: 
-`~/.config/{nix, nixpkgs}/`:
-```bash
-cp /etc/nix/nix.conf ~/.config/nix/nix.conf
-cp /etc/nixos/configuration.nix ~/.config/nixpkgs/configuration.nix
-```
-
-Nix will now use these user-specific files to read its config :)
-
-### Flakes Support
-Nix (the pkg mgr) does not come with Flakes support out-of-the-box. 
-So we need to enable it: 
-1. In `~/.config/nix/nix.conf` add:
-```
-experimental-features = nix-command flakes
-```
-
-2. Apply it:
-```bash
-sudo nixos-rebuild switch
-```
-Read about [Flakes](https://nixos.wiki/wiki/Flakes).
-
-### Home Manager Support
-Now we can install the Home-Manager flake.
-1. Init our base flake:
-```bash
-cd ~/.config/nixpkgs
-nix flake init
-```
-This should generate two files:
-```
-flake.nix
-flake.lock
-```
-2. Next we tell `flake.nix` to manage all our configuration (system + home) for our system:
-```nix
-{
-  description = "NixOS configuration";
-
-  inputs = {
-    nixpkgs.url = "github:nixos/nixpkgs/nixos-unstable";
-    home-manager.url = "github:nix-community/home-manager";
-    home-manager.inputs.nixpkgs.follows = "nixpkgs";
-    nixos-hardware.url = "github:NixOS/nixos-hardware/master";
-  };
-
-  outputs = inputs@{ nixpkgs, home-manager, nixos-hardware, ... }: {
-    nixosConfigurations = {
-      # Change below to use your hostname from configuration.nix
-      "art-sr" = nixpkgs.lib.nixosSystem {
-        system = "x86_64-linux";
-        modules = [
-          ./configuration.nix
-          nixos-hardware.nixosModules.framework
-          home-manager.nixosModules.home-manager
-          {
-            home-manager.useGlobalPkgs = true;
-            home-manager.useUserPackages = true;
-      	    # Change below to use your username from configuration.nix
-            home-manager.users.kdam0 = import ./home.nix;
-
-            # Optionally, use home-manager.extraSpecialArgs to pass
-            # arguments to home.nix
-          }
-        ];
-      };
-    };
-  };
-}
-```
->"art-sr" is my hostname for this machine.
-
-In my case, I also have the following two lines specifically to load settings for my hardware:
-```
-    nixos-hardware.url = "github:NixOS/nixos-hardware/master";
-    ...
-          nixos-hardware.nixosModules.framework
-```
-you will need to modify these values based on your [hardware support](https://github.com/NixOS/nixos-hardware).
-
-3. Create a `~/.config/nixpkgs/home.nix` file with your values:
-```nix
-{ config, pkgs, ...}: 
-{
-  home.username = "kdam0";
-  home.homeDirectory = "/home/kdam0";
-
-  programs.home-manager.enable = true;
-  home.stateVersion = "22.11";
-
-  services.gpg-agent = {
-    enable = true;
-    defaultCacheTtl = 1800;
-    enableSshSupport = true;
-  };
-}
-```
-
-4. Apply:
-```bash
-sudo nixos-rebuild switch
-```
-> It took a few attempts to get NixOS to re-build successfully. 
-I ran into a few different issues involving users, and hostnames 
-while following the official docs until I arrived at the configs above which worked.
-
-Read about [Home Manager flake](https://nix-community.github.io/home-manager/index.html#ch-nix-flakes).
-
-**This would be a good time init a git repo in `~/.config/nixpkgs/` and publish your progress.**
-
-## Setting up the GUI
-### Window Manager + bar + system info.
-Getting `dwl` is easy enough. In my `home.nix`:
-```
-  home.packages = [
-    pkgs.dwl
-    ...
-  ];
-```
-This will install `dwl` on a rebuild. 
-Then I can run it with `dwl`. 
-
-Oh it fails...something about permissions...
-In `~/.config/nixpkgs/configuration.nix` make sure you have:
-```
-  security.polkit.enable = true;
-```
-
-Oh it fails again with GLE errors :( Add:
-```
-  hardware.opengl = {
-    enable = true;
-    driSupport = true;
-  };
-```
-
-**Sweet now it launches!**
-
-But of course I need to configure the keys - that's the whole point of a WM.
-Additionally, `dwl` requires a re-build on every config change...
-
-**How do I tell Nix to use my config file while installing/building `dwl`?**
-
-Lucking all packages (`pkgs.*`) build files are defined on their GitHub.
-We can see that we are allowed to pass in a `conf` argument to
-[this](https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/blob/master/pkgs/applications/window-managers/dwl/default.nix)
-file.
-
-After a bit of digging around, I arrived at how to do it:
-
-1. First copy your `config.h` to `~/.config/nixpkgs/dwl/config.h`.
-2. Then point to it in your `home.nix`:
-```
-  home.packages = [
-    (pkgs.dwl.override {
-      # trying to supply config.home.homeDirectory here leads to "impure" usage.
-      # so disabling it for now.
-      # conf = (builtins.readFile "${config.home.homeDirectory}/.config/dwl/config.h");
-      conf = ./dwl/config.h;
-    })
-    ...
-  ];
-```
-
-> I know I can just clone the source myself and build it, but I like to use the default
-package manager whenever possible to manage packages.
-
-Of course since `dwl` is as minimal as it gets, it does not ship with a bar.
-We have many options for which bar to use, 
-I have very little use for a bar, so I kept it very simple and went with `somebar`:
-```
-  home.packages = [
-    ...
-    pkgs.somebar
-    ...
-  ];
-```
-
-If you want status info on your bar you can use something like `someblocks` - which will 
-let you script simple scripts with text output you want displayed in each block.
-This will need to be cloned and built manually as it is not available in the Nix repos.
-
-Oh but you probably don't have `make` or any requirements to actually build it...fear not:
-```bash
-nix-shell -p gnumake
-```
-which put you in a temporary environment with all the common build tools available.
-Now you can:
-```bash
-sudo make install
-```
-
-`wbg` is a simple background setter for Wayland......aaaand BAM!
-
-![dwl pic](dwl.png)
-
-### Terminal
-I use [`foot`](https://codeberg.org/dnkl/foot).
-
-Create the config file in `~/.config/nixpkgs/foot/foot.ini`:
-```
-# for transparency #
-[colors]
-alpha=0.7
-```
-
-Use it in `home.nix`:
-```
-  home.file.".config/foot/foot.ini".source = ../../common/foot/foot.ini;
-```
-
-> I use this pattern for pretty much all my *dotfiles*:
-```
-  # script that sets a bg.
-  home.file."bg.sh".source = common/bg.sh;
-  # script that starts my gui env.
-  home.file."start.sh".source = common/start.sh;
-  # foot config
-  home.file.".config/foot/foot.ini".source = common/foot/foot.ini;
-  # wofi config (app launcher)
-  home.file.".config/wofi/style.css".source = common/wofi/style.css;
-  # mako config (notifications)
-  home.file.".config/mako/config".source = common/mako/config;
-```
-
-### Sound
-In my `configuration.nix`:
-```
-  security.rtkit.enable = true;
-  services.pipewire = {
-    enable = true;
-    alsa.enable = true;
-    alsa.support32Bit = true;
-    pulse.enable = true;
-    wireplumber.enable = true;
-    media-session.enable = false;
-    jack.enable = true;
-    systemWide = false;
-  };
-```
-
-### Nextcloud
-I want a purely CLI way to handle this, and a periodic sync is sufficient for me.
-We do this with `systemd-timers` (Nix advises against `cron`). 
-In my `home.nix`:
-```
-  systemd.user.services = {
-    nextcloud-sync = {
-      Unit = {
-        Description = "Auto sync Nextcloud";
-        After = "network-online.target";
-      };
-      Service = {
-        Type = "simple";
-        EnvironmentFile = "${config.home.homeDirectory}/.nextcloud.env";
-        ExecStart = ''
-          ${pkgs.nextcloud-client}/bin/nextcloudcmd \
-          -h --non-interactive \
-          --user "''${NEXTCLOUD_USER}" \
-          --password "''${NEXTCLOUD_PASSWORD}" \
-          ''${NEXTCLOUD_DIR} \
-          ''${NEXTCLOUD_URL}
-        '';
-        TimeoutStopSec = "180";
-        KillMode = "process";
-        KillSignal = "SIGINT";
-      };
-      Install.WantedBy = ["multi-user.target"];
-    };
-  };
-  systemd.user.timers = {
-    nextcloud-sync = {
-      Unit.Description = "Automatic sync files with Nextcloud when booted up after 5 minutes then rerun every 10 minutes";
-      Timer.OnUnitActiveSec = "10min";
-      Install.WantedBy = ["multi-user.target" "timers.target"];
-    };
-  };
-  systemd.user.startServices = true;
-```
-
-## Conclusions
-1. Yes setting things up from a minimal iso is harder than in Manjaro.
-Although I got everything I wanted working, there were many times I felt 
-like giving up. (Aside: I am *so grateful* for Manjaro, and Arch wikis).
-That said, I expect this friction is a one-time cost for building familiarity with Nix, 
-and well worth the benefits that come with it.
-2. You bet Wayland is ready. Multi-monitor works out-of-the-box, 
-all my apps support it, and things just *feel* more polished than I have ever felt with Xorg.
-3. `dwl` is as awesome as I had hoped! This is my daily driver now.
-
-## My configs
-All the configs discussed (and more) are in my [nixdotfiles repo](https://gitlab.com/kdam0/dotfiles-nix).