f5dfe78a1e
This patch add a new argument to Nixpkgs default expression named "overlays".
By default, the value of the argument is either taken from the environment variable `NIXPKGS_OVERLAYS`,
or from the directory `~/.nixpkgs/overlays/`. If the environment variable does not name a valid directory
then this mechanism would fallback on the home directory. If the home directory does not exists it will
fallback on an empty list of overlays.
The overlays directory should contain the list of extra Nixpkgs stages which would be used to extend the
content of Nixpkgs, with additional set of packages. The overlays, i-e directory, files, symbolic links
are used in alphabetical order.
The simplest overlay which extends Nixpkgs with nothing looks like:
```nix
self: super: {
}
```
More refined overlays can use `super` as the basis for building new packages, and `self` as a way to query
the final result of the fix-point.
An example of overlay which extends Nixpkgs with a small set of packages can be found at:
https://github.com/nbp/nixpkgs-mozilla/blob/nixpkgs-overlay/moz-overlay.nix
To use this file, checkout the repository and add a symbolic link to
the `moz-overlay.nix` file in `~/.nixpkgs/overlays` directory.
Nixpkgs is a collection of packages for the Nix package manager. It is periodically built and tested by the hydra build daemon as so-called channels. To get channel information via git, add nixpkgs-channels as a remote:
% git remote add channels git://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs-channels.git
For stability and maximum binary package support, it is recommended to maintain
custom changes on top of one of the channels, e.g. nixos-16.09 for the latest
release and nixos-unstable for the latest successful build of master:
% git remote update channels
% git rebase channels/nixos-16.09
For pull-requests, please rebase onto nixpkgs master.
NixOS linux distribution source code is located inside
nixos/ folder.
- NixOS installation instructions
- Documentation (Nix Expression Language chapter)
- Manual (How to write packages for Nix)
- Manual (NixOS)
- Nix Wiki (deprecated, see milestone "Move the Wiki!")
- Continuous package builds for unstable/master
- Continuous package builds for 16.09 release
- Tests for unstable/master
- Tests for 16.09 release
Communication: