[Nix-dev] Flattening pkgs tree in nixpkgs/pkgs

[jeaye]

I'm not a fan of this at all, for a few reasons.

>    Each time I want to find a package name I do
>    * find -name '*name*'
>    or use github search to locate files in repo.

Or you can use https://nixos.org/nixos/packages.html which also links
directly to the Nix expression, lists the maintainers, home page, and
even gives a command you can copy for installing imperatively.

The categorization may not be ideal, currently, but I absolutely
support categorization of all packages.

>    * Have to be maintained
>    * Harder to find things
>    * Lack of any package manager which tells about it

It helps fit the directory limitations imposed by Github, sure, and I'd
argue that it makes packages *easier to find*. If you know a package's
name, use the link above, or find(1), or Github. If you don't know a
package's name, but you know what it does, then the categories are very
helpful. Extending out of just nixpkgs into NixOS modules, we can see
just how helpful this becomes:

https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/tree/master/nixos/modules/services/security

Say I want to see what NixOS provides for tightening up my machine.
There's a category just for it and games, networking, monitoring, etc.
This is priceless.

I'd support a rework of the categories to be easier to navigate, but
that would likely result in *more* categories, not fewer.