[Nix-dev] Re: Please update of stdenv-linux tarballs

[Peter Simons]

Hi Ludovic,

 > As for the broken Red Hat kernel, I think it’s great if Nixpkgs can
 > support it, but only if that’s not too much of a maintenance burden;
 > the primary target should remain NixOS, and then distributions that
 > ship (almost) unmodified upstream software.

as it is right now, Nix doesn't support Red Hat's broken kernel,
because the current bootstrap tools use a glibc newer than 2.5
already. That issue is not a big deal, though, because the kernel in
question is quite old and chances are slim that many people still use
it today.

What concerns me is not so much that particular bug. I am concerned
about the bugs that might be discovered after that update has been
merged. The bootstrap tools are a single point of failure for new
users who'd like to try out Nix. If Nix can't bootstrap itself, then
there's not much anyone can do with it. You or I or anyone else on
this list can work around such a problem, but new users will have
neither the knowledge nor the incentive to do so. This situation gives
us an incentive to provide bootstrap tools that are very reliable --
after all, we want Nix to be used!

In my humble opinion, a sensible guideline would be that bootstrap
tools are not supposed to be modified unless they have to be.

Now, I understand Lluís needs the latest binutils in bootstrap tools.
That is a perfectly legitimate interest, and I am all for it. I wonder
about the update to glibc 2.12.1, though. Is that really necessary to
support loongson2f?

Take care,
Peter