[Nix-dev] Suggestion: Home configuration.

[Nicolas Pierron]

On Thu, Jun 19, 2008 at 08:13, Marc Weber <marco-oweber at gmx.de> wrote:
> Hii Nicolas,
>
> just a quick uncomplete reply
>
> On Wed, Jun 18, 2008 at 08:55:00PM +0200, Nicolas Pierron wrote:
>> Hi list,
>>
>> I have experimented many issues that may require a kind of $HOME
>> configuration.  Many package provide a /etc which contains a default
>> resource script which is often used as a base for the system.  As Nix
>> packages are pure, the system configuration is not changed unless this
>> packages are installed with the system (I guess).  Therefore if any
>> user install a tool which require a minimal configuration the tool
>> will not work properly.
>>
>> Packages can provide a script that will be used to configure the $HOME
>> directory of the current user if no configuration files exists yet.
>> This can be used to create a nice default configurations which can be
>> generated and updated with the corresponding package.
>>
>> With this feature, I think we can expect to move upstart &
>> configuration script inside nixpkgs instead of nixos.
>>
>> Stupid question: can any user install and configure the following
>> servers in user land: apache, sshd, subversion, xserver, etc ..?
>
>> I was thinking about that after running "wmii" which was not able to
>> act on any event (which is quite bad for a windows manager) because
>> the default configuration was not available.
> Does it work for you now?

I have not test it now because I had some running process yesterday.


> So you propose mixing .svn/.git/.hg/ .. config (
> settings ignored files, known repos with login and password) ?
> Think of firefox etc. It does mean we have more effort to see which
> information should be set by your personal config, and which by the
> application. Firefo is another example: If you configure it to have
> plugin x and y what should happen with c which you'e istalled by the
> wizard? Should it be removed because nix no longer know it has/ hasn't
> installed it?

No I am suggesting a clean install of the home directory if the user
request it.  Which means that this will erase all configurations
already done by the user for the specified package.

However, if the nix-expression are nicely configurable, users should
be able to generate most them and stay with the nix expression instead
of modifying the generated files.  This could become as powerful as
the "lessopen" script provided by Gentoo.  The remaining question is
which script the user will have to "source" to enable each feature?

> Adding unixODBC stuff I had the same trouble. I decided to just add it
> to nixos because I knew I could finish it that way :-(
>
> About Apache: Don't know for sure. You nee kind of root priviledges to
> bind to IP addresse below 5000 (?) But the way to go here is telling
> apache to publish a directory of each user (${HOME}/www or such)..
> But on the other hand you can choose the user /group. (Don't set it to
> your username, shell options and such will be overridden)
> But in general you could. Try netcat for example.

Apache and the others are just in my previous mail to show that it may
not be as easy as the system administrator to configure a server in
user-land.

-- 
Nicolas Pierron
- If you are doing something twice then you should try to do it once.
- Do not print documents, save your printer ;)