nix profile has bad UX

[bobvanderlinden]

There are quite a few UX problems with nix profile. I'd like to document them to give some context:

• nix profile pins nixpkgs per package #7964
• nix profiles are hard to reproduce #7965
• nix profile: match entries using flake uri #10064
• nix profile stores a 'resolved' source attribute #10077
• nix allows duplicate binaries even for different packages under certain conditions #9801
• More concise nix profile list #10098
• Show package priority in nix profile list #9802
• nix profile upgrade should warn the user if the flake is pinned #8704
• nix profile remove '.*' doesn't remove path installabes #7487
• nix profile cannot intuitively upgrade all packages #10162
• nix profile counter-intuitively uses regexp to match packages #7962
• "nix profile" allows installing duplicate packages #5587
• 'nix profile' has terrible experience upgrading packages #7530
• nix profiles upgrade and remove have counter-intuitive argument #7960
• nix profile subcommands rely on index identifier #7961
• nix profile: Allow referring to elements by human-readable name #8678

I thought I'd gather them here in a single overarching issue, instead of listing the problems all here.

[bobvanderlinden]

3 of these issues can be resolved if we could refer to installed packages by name instead of by index:

• nix profile entries need stable identifiers #7967

[thufschmitt]

Thanks a lot for listing all these. I think that will be incredibly useful for #7701

[alper]

I just got here and with all the documentation around it I still haven't been able to figure out what nix profile does and why I need it or how to use it.

Given how confusing a lot of the documentation is… maybe a full revamp is in order.

Update: I got it. nix profile is great, the documentation in CLI and on web are good and it's the simplest way really to install global packages.

[nixos-discourse]

This issue has been mentioned on NixOS Discourse. There might be relevant details there:

https://discourse.nixos.org/t/flakes-as-a-unified-format-for-profiles/29476/1

[iFreilicht]

#6481 was abandoned in favor of #8631; you may want to update the todo list :)

[nixos-discourse]

This issue has been mentioned on NixOS Discourse. There might be relevant details there:

https://discourse.nixos.org/t/nix-flakes-is-an-experiment-that-did-too-much-at-once/32707/12

[viperML]

Thanks for compiling the issues. I wanted to write a home-manager alternative ( https://github.com/viperML/activation-manager ), that relies on being installed as part of a buildEnv + nix profile install /flake#package-output. But I just faced all the bad UX of nix profile.

[iFreilicht]

@bobvanderlinden now that #8678 has been merged, could you re-evaluate whether which of these issues are resolved?

[nixos-discourse]

This issue has been mentioned on NixOS Discourse. There might be relevant details there:

https://discourse.nixos.org/t/2023-12-15-nix-team-meeting-minutes-112/38155/1

[iFreilicht]

Two more issues that might be worth adding here: #10463, #10419

[bobvanderlinden]

@iFreilicht I think they can both be considered duplicates. I've commented in the issues.

[trim21]

nix profile remove --all will also remove nix itself, is this expected?

[iFreilicht]

@trim21 Yes. nix profile expects a system-wide nix installation to be present. If you end up in this situation, you can still search for nix by running a glob and picking one of the outputs. For example:

# echo /nix/store/*-nix-2*/bin
/nix/store/009hyb1ryy8jrypqikcaz4nfh3xkbaaz-nix-2.18.2/bin/ /nix/store/h16lidvhs90r2pvqns0kkv9ffha0h25p-nix-2.19.4/bin/ /nix/store/hghqbpw1d5a2kqzjjn68wm9klqbmjvk0-nix-2.18.2/bin/ /nix/store/l876hksjiz1240d5in5ksdzskag0w15k-nix-2.18.7/bin/ /nix/store/ma0p24nzjcylflyn4bz4wj8kf28a7ida-nix-2.18.5/bin/ /nix/store/nxk53ss4jcbf6i3pf1r1gz7di5jhaajm-nix-2.18.2/bin/ /nix/store/nzf1wy0z8j8dpsv49x8g5i93c7i6bcph-nix-2.18.5/bin/ /nix/store/xcdazpgbpc3inr2hqsxahb0wmbndp04a-nix-2.19.6/bin/ /nix/store/ycn722fb286lpg0h32lg935l6nxjhkq5-nix-2.19.6/bin/
# /nix/store/009hyb1ryy8jrypqikcaz4nfh3xkbaaz-nix-2.18.2/bin/nix profile install nixpkgs#nix
# nix --version
nix (Nix) 2.18.7

If you think this is a bad idea and want to it to be changed, please open a separate issue so we can discuss it there :)