[Nix-dev] Packaging software that mutates itself

[Eelco Dolstra]

Hi,

On 06/05/16 00:02, Nikita Karetnikov wrote:

> Has anyone packaged something like this?  What's a proper way to solve this
> without compromising the integrity of a system (think of potential security
> issues or just proper operation)?  

There is no way to solve this. Packages with ad hoc auto-updaters are
fundamentally incompatible with system package managers (except if they play
nice with the package manager, but they never do). They're especially
incompatible with declarative configuration management - e.g., if I deploy a
system with version X of some package, I don't want it to suddenly morph into
version Y on my production system.

The best thing to do is to disable the auto-update functionality if possible.

-- 
Eelco Dolstra | LogicBlox, Inc. | http://nixos.org/~eelco/