Why not? It always seemed to me like a lot of duplicated work to package everything on every distro.
Yes, but each package manager has it’s (dis-)advantages. It’s great to have flatpak and docker to be able to run software on almost all distros, but the OS still needs a way to update.
Almost all immutable distros use multiple package manager.
- Fedora Silverblue: rpm-ostree + flatpak (+ toolbox)
- OpenSUSE MicroOS: zypper with snapshots (transactional-update) + flatpak (+ distrobox)
- NixOS is unique since it only uses the Nix package manager
- immutable Ubuntu will probably only use snap for OS + apps.
All those OS support distrobox and docker additionally.
NixOS is unique because it uses the only potent package manager (if we don’t count that one reimplementation of Nix). Calling the others “package managers” becomes mostly a courtesy when NixOS enters the picture.
lalala with FS-level snapshots + flatpak + distrobox + a kitchen sink
look_what_they_need_to_mimic_the_fraction_of_our_power.png
I don’t consider myself a dumb person but I couldn’t figure out nix when last I decided to play with it. Theoretically it seems super interesting to me, but I really just can’t dedicate the time again now to learn that esoteric syntax.
The docs for NixOS aren’t good. Much knowledge is on many blogs but who knows them all?
Having the OS defined declaratively is great but I also dislike the Nix language.
Once it’s setup NixOS is great. Sharing configs with PC and laptop is awesome. Rollbacks are baked in.
Going off the https://github.com/Misterio77/nix-starter-configs helped me gettung started.
I found zero to nix to be a good tutorial
Flatpak seems quite nice now days
