[Nix-dev] Is there a definite list of pre-reqs for nix for RPMs

[Tony White]

2009/7/21 Milind Parikh <milindparikh at gmail.com>:
> My bad... when I saw "it should work on any RPM-based Linux distribution
> based on glibc 2.or later."... I thought that it would work without any
> additional work. Anyways not a big deal..I can always target the distros.
>
> The security comments and replies are more interesting. If one really wants
> to use nix in production, these are the kind of the issues that will come
> up. Ironically there is simply no other package manager (that I know ) that
> can produce the security that nix can; with the attendant reliability.
> Notice I am not saying that packages built with nix will be absolutely
> secure and reliable. But it is, in theory, as good as it can get. Of course
> some well pruning algorithms would significant cut down on the very
> substantial storage space requirements.
>
>
> Regards
> -- Milind
>
>
>
> On Tue, Jul 21, 2009 at 10:06 AM, Lluís Batlle <viriketo at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> 2009/7/21 Tony White <tonywhite100 at googlemail.com>:
>> > 2009/7/21 Milind Parikh <milindparikh at gmail.com>:
>> >> Thanks for the detailed explanation ! It was very useful.
>> >>
>> >> The question that still remains:
>> >>
>> >> (a) I know that I cannot "just install a nix RPM" despite the claim
>> >> that "it
>> >> should work on any RPM-based Linux distribution based on glibc 2.or
>> >> later.".
>> >> So I need to know what is the "base requirement for deploying nix is"
>> >> (and
>> >> more importantly, how will I know how this requirement will change with
>> >> time).
>>
>> I thought that rpm had basic dependency checking, so a RPM file can
>> ask for a minimal glibc version. I understand from Milind's report
>> that the actual RPMs don't mention the glibc dependency correctly.
>>
>> I don't care about nix RPMs, but I think Milind reported a "bug" to be
>> fixed in the RPM releases. Those caring on nix RPMs could give an
>> answer in this thread.
>>
>> As far as RPM packages contain compiled binaries, I don't think it can
>> be asserted that easily that it "should work on any RPM-based glibc 2
>> or later". Specially the "or later" part is prone to put the assertion
>> on prove.
>>
>> Regarding nix source code, I think it can be compiled only with recent
>> versions of gcc. I tried on 3.x, and it didn't work. Maybe the newer
>> gcc 4 depends on a minimal glibc 2.x version.
>>
>> Regards,
>> Lluís.
>
>

Hi Milind,
I run :

rm -rf /tmp/* && nix-env --delete-generations old && nix-store --gc &&
nix-collect-garbage -d && nix-store --optimise

As root, when I have a profile I have tested and am happy with. It
cleans the store up along with anything in /tmp.
I think that the nix-store --gc && nix-collect-garbage -d are the same
thing but that's what I use. It makes space requirements quite
ordinary but it removes any fallback profiles.

Thanks,
Tony