[Nix-dev] Sources and binaries

[Pjotr Prins]

I guess I lack some understanding of the build farm infrastructure,
but there is not much information. For my scientific 'customers' I
have some use cases. The basic reason is that I want them to be able
to reference a package - if someone wishes to replicate results down
the line.

(1) When I create an expression I wire in a tarball of the original
source code. I would like to be able to rebuild that same package
later - but the tar ball may have disappeared. Eelco wrote there are
facilities for mirroring these. How does it work, and will it remain?
Do I need to set up my own mirror to guarantee my packages? I have
half a mind to do that for my specific packages.

(2) Expressions may get added to the build farm. Great for testing!!
And this way we get binary packages. Are there limitations to the
resource of storing these packages? And how long will they remain when
future expresssions have newer versions? Or do I need to create a
mirror for these 'outdated' binary packages too (I don't want them to
disappear). I guess I would need to store full 'closures' for each,
or create a closure with all of them.

So, in short I wish to keep track of old sources and old binaries -
potentially forever.  Maybe the best way is to create my own resource
for source code and binaries? What do you think?

Pj.