[Nix-dev] A few beginner issues

[Bjørn Forsman]

Hi Nick,

On 30 July 2016 at 00:24, Nick Sabalausky <bus_nixos_list at semitwist.com> wrote:
> [...]
> 1. I'm having trouble getting vmware guest additions to work. I followed the
> instruction here...
>
>   https://nixos.org/wiki/Installing_NixOS_in_a_VirtualBox_guest
>
> ...to add the following line to my /etc/nixos/configuration.nix...
>
>   virtualisation.virtualbox.guest.enable = true;
>
> ...but after I "nixos-rebuild switch" and reboot, the display manager no
> longer starts and dmesg includes this suspicious looking line:
>
>   stage-1-init: modprobe: ERROR: could not insert 'vboxsf': No such device

I guess that means the virtualbox driver doesn't work with vmware.
(Two competing VM technologies, no surprise really.)

I've never used vmware on Linux. I use VirtualBox. NixOS distributes
OVA files that you can import straight into VirtualBox. I think that's
a very easy way to get started.

> 2. When I'm in KDE4 on NixOS, I can change the display resolution, but the
> change doesn't persist across a reboot. Why is this? What is the correct way
> to make it persist? Haven't had this happen in other distros.

Are you sure you're booting from your installation on disk and not the
Live CD? I don't use KDE, but at least in GNOME the screen resolution
is persisted (no need for NixOS option for that). I'd be surprised if
it didn't work like that on KDE too.

> 3. I added "firefox" (minus quotes) to the environment.systemPackages list
> in configuration.nix, did rebuild/switch, and it's now installed and works,
> BUT it installed Firefox Nightly instead of a firefox release. How would I
> go about installing a release instead of nightly?

I think NixOS only ships "nightly" due to licensing or branding rights
or something. Others may fill inn here.

> 4. When looking up the firefox packages, I noticed a "firefox-unwrapped".
> What is that and how does it differ from the package "firefox"?

The -unwrapped version doesn't know about plugins. I guess most people
will want the normal "firefox" package.

Best regards,
Bjørn Forsman