[Nix-dev] NixOS on Azure?

[Ross Gardler (MS OPEN TECH)]

I see that NixOS has images available for some of the popular clouds, but not for Azure. I'd love to see a NixOS image on VM Depot<http://vmdepot.msopentech.com/>. VM Depot is a community managed repository of virtual machines for Azure. We have something like 8 different Linux distros and around 1700 images built on those distros (ranging from developer stacks through to end user applications).

The first step to getting folks to publish NixOS based images is to have a base distribution of NixOS available and, preferably, updated every time there is an official release of NixOS. Is anyone here interested in creating and upload an image to VM Depot? I'm happy to help guide the process.

Some common questions for the curious:


1)      Does it cost anything to store an image on VM Depot? No - all storage costs are paid by Microsoft Open Technologies, Inc (my employer)

2)      Does it cost anything to publish an image on VM Depot? Probably not - You will need an Azure subscription to temporarily store the image and there will be bandwidth charges for the initial copy. However, there are mechanisms by which we can ensure open source projects have sufficient Azure credits to do this without receiving a bill. Create a free Windows Azure trial subscription<http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/pricing/free-trial/?WT.mc_id=AA4C1C935> to get started straight away (one month, $200 credit)

3)      Are there an restrictions on what can be uploaded to VM Depot? - Short answer - if its open source then no there are no restrictions. Long answer is in the Terms of Use http://vmdepot.msopentech.com/ToU.htm

4)      Why would I want to upload an image to VM Depot? It is easy for people to deploy a VM from VM Depot to Azure. This means it is easy for people to experiment with your project. More people experimenting means more users, more users means more potential contributors to the project and more potential customers for those employing contributors.

5)      How do I get started creating a new VM based on an existing distribution? See http://msopentech.com/blog/2014/05/14/deploy-customize-freebsd-virtual-machine-image-microsoft-azure/ for a description of the general process (need not be FreeBSD as the starting image, the process is the same for any of the other images available)

6)      How do I get started creating a new base distribution VM? http://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/virtual-machines-linux-tutorial/

7)      Who can I contact for assistance? Ross Gardler - ross.gardler at microsoft.com

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