from bsergay@discuss.online to linux@lemmy.ml on 07 Jul 2024 22:30
https://discuss.online/post/9490944
NixOS’ influence and importance at pushing Linux forward into the (previously) unexplored landscape of configuring your complete system through a single config file is undeniable. It’s been a wild ride, but it was well worth it.
And although it has only been relatively recently that it has lost its niche status, the recent influx of so-called ‘immutable’ distros springing up like mushrooms is undeniably linked to and inspired by NixOS.
However, unfortunately, while this should have been very exciting times for what’s yet to come, the recent drama surrounding the project has definitely tarnished how the project is perceived.
NixOS’ ideas will definitely live on regardless. But how do you envision NixOS’ own future? Any ETA’s for when this drama will end? Which lessons have we learned (so far) from this drama? Are there any winners as a result of this drama? Could something like this happen to any distro?
In case you’re out of the loop. Though, there’s a lot that has transpired since but which hasn’t been rigorously documented at a single place; like how 4 out of 5 NixOS board members have quit over the last 2 months or so.
threaded - newest
In September the NixOS constitutional assembly should finish their work, and the community will be able to elect governance. I’m guessing that’s when the drama will start getting resolved.
In the meantime, there are multiple maintainers that have left because of the drama - which is more troublesome than the board members leaving - but nixpkgs has a LOT of maintainers, and there are new ones joining all the time. It’s still healthy and won’t implode so quickly.
Informative post. Thank you!
Is Nix really so important to the world that it needs a constitutional assembly, a board of directors, and general elections?
I always gathered that it was a niche project within the niche of Linux distro projects.
Is it a bunch of people playing out a company governance fantasy or is it actually a large, well valued company? I think that the vast majority of people wouldn’t even be able to make an informed voting decision.
I am also quite out of the loop I feel…
I heard developers find it rather easy to do reproducible build in Nix, so it is more utilized over dev landscape. Basically a competitor of docker, and quite significant one at that. That’s why it is considered big, despite that it is niche from desktop linux pov.
It’s probably wise to simply ignore the drama. Open source seems to invite this at the “top” for whatever reason, but for the casual user there is usually little to no impact.
Unless you’re trying to be a top contributor to nix, I would just carry on with normal usage and all the current drama will blow over.
Idk imo knowing about the drama makes me hesitant to go back, especially since I switched all my development environments from Nix to Guix and I dont want to have three package managers lol Plus the Guix community seems really close knit
Also, happy cake day!
Conway’s Law applies in this respect; the mess in governance of Nix has produced a product that reflects that mess. Nix started a beautiful movement but like many first movers, they rarely reap long-term rewards.
Oof. That sucks. Didn’t know that was a thing
I would avoid getting locked in to one platform. Portable and flexible is better
Yeah that makes sense. I still have my old nix shell files so I can use them if need be for my environments
All good reasons to make a decision, I’m not trying to sway anyone in a direction.
I just feel bad when people see drama in a community and wonder if that thing is “safe”. I’ve seen this kind of thing many times before in other communities—PERL, Python, Ruby, Rust, etc—and it never seems to lead to sweeping changes the normal user would notice. It’s pretty safe to assume that day-to-day users of thing can just carry on if they don’t care about the community upset.
That’s true. That’s what I’ve been seeing in places, people just saying to continue on and ignore the drama. And I know I shouldn’t let a group idea/thing dictate whether I use nix but like I was already starting to not like how it seemed like a lot of people were like “write all your stuff in nix (configs, etc)” and I didn’t want to get locked in. Plus I got busy and didn’t feel like tinkering with it. Idk. I was already losing interest in a weird way. I still think immutable/reproducible distros are cool though. I’m now just currently running Guix on top of arch and using aconfmgr to emulate some reproducibility.
NixOS is never going mainstream. When the answer to everything is oh just write a package for it. Unless their is a nice gui to edit your configuration file also it well always be niche.
Not to add fuel to the flame by asking, but how’s it been on Guix? I’ve heard Guix does a lot of things better, but also that there’s far less packages and it’s harder on modern hardware.
I’m not the op, but I’ve been using guix for several months on a new fairly top of the line desktop PC and it’s going great. I’ve been able to play steam games and set up my dev environment with basically no issues.
The catch is you need to use non-official repositories (i.e. github.com/nonguix/nonguix) to use the non-libre kernel and other software not on the official channel.
There’s also this nice little search engine - https://toys.whereis.みんな/ - where you can look for packages from other repos (or channels as they are called in guix).
I use Nix on my macos work laptop to set up my dev environment, but I definitely prefer guix so far, mostly due to the it being configured in guile over the weird nix language. The biggest advantage I see of Nix is that it has a bit more features and lots more packages.
I am a pretty hardcore emacs user and lisp lover though, so ymmv.
gitlab.com/nonguix/nonguix
They literally have this as the link in all their docs so I am not sure why you would choose the mirror on the fully-proprietary, Microsoft-owned code forge.
I chose the mirror cause I was just writing that comment super quickly on my phone. But uh, thanks for the right link I guess?
I haven’t tried running a full Guix system yet but im really liking it as a package manager on top of arch. Yes, hardware support can be iffy, but there is an unofficial channel called nonguix that packages the standard Linux kernel instead of linux-libre, and yes there are less packages but honestly packages are so much more fun to write? I’ve written a few package definitions for both my own use and ive made a request to add one to the official channel. And I feel like, if I really needed something that would not be packaged due to complexity or something, I could try and use flatpak or an appimage or something. I think its definitely worth checking out.
uh, the drama being what it is about people in positions of power blocking efforts to make a welcoming and diverse nixos community, persisting right wing concern trolling, and especially what appears to be maybe a military tech company takeover of nixos, it’s hella understandable people would want to reconsider using this tech on their own hardware and it’s pretty sus to respond to this with ‘ah just drama it’ll blow over’…
Just like the xz backdoor I agree “nothing to see here, move along” seems like bad advice.
It is curious to wonder how much state actors and militaries are involved in weaponizing FOSS culture to purge potential perceived opponents.
For this reason sticking to technological merit and leaving personal beliefs out of FOSS seems wise.
FOSS shouldn’t be state actor’s play thing. When leadership behaves radically and is exclusive it looses my respect & support.
Understandable, maybe to some. But no matter how hard the activist core currently in charge of the moderation team would like me to believe it, not everyone brings political activism to the table on this project. And that’s a good thing. It is still perfectly possible to enjoy working with good tech and build cool stuff without bringing a soap box alongside your laptop.
fuckin yikes
wait until they find out where computers and the internet came from. or Tor… GPS, etc etc.
Of how much “militsry” contributed to FOSS. Or how Linux is no longer the lone programmer hacking on code in there spare time. But the vast majority of FOSS is done by companies.
Didn’t GPS come from NASA?
If you think that’s a military take over. Don’t look under the rug of Linux/foss at large.
Worst case the community forks. This is the benefit of open source.
lix.systems
guix.gnu.org
gitlab.com/nonguix/nonguix
Are Nixos configurations compatible with this one?
As far as I can tell, they are 100% different. Guix uses Guile Scheme, NixOS uses the custom Nix language.
Can you link any good guides on transistioning to guix?
As I used to say. The Nix community acts more like a cult of people willing to support flat earth.
What does this mean?
It means that questioning decisions or problems is seen as negative in the community generally and that everyone else must be wrong for not using NixOS.
Thanks for posting. I was unaware of current events. That’s quite the rabbit hole!
I don’t believe in immutable distros. They are not well developed now so it’s a bubble that should pop soon after people realize they are not ready yet and have a lot of disadvantages. Also they are unsuitable for old PCs and Nix seems relatively good for them so I don’t think Nix will die completely but we’ll have to see.
Immutablity is like Wayland or Flatpak, ready for prime time for a subset of users and still in development which means they can only improve.
Wayland is meant to fully replace X11 and become the standard. Immutability as the idea itself has significant features that are advantages for some users but disadvantages or even deal breakers for others.
I can’t agree. Wayland should be THE display system we use. Flatpak can’t achieve full market dominance because the command line experience (especially for using cli apps) still sucks (and that’s where snaps come in to play). Immutable distros target an even smaller subset of users. Not only are they unsuitable for some use cases, but they’re also in complete opposition to some people’s workflows.
Interesting take.
This seems more philosophical than on technicalities. If this is correct, would you mind elaborating on the philosophical side?
Even if this were the case, shouldn’t the constant development and continuous improvement result in something that’s (eventually) well-developed? The only way I could see this holding some truth is if by design the ‘immutable’ model (whatever that is) happens to be broken or something like that. Like, how some file systems are simply better than Btrfs (or any CoW filesystem for that matter) for specific tasks; i.e. ensure to use the right tool for the right task. So, do you pose that ‘immutable distros’ are by design not well-suited? If so, why?
So you (actually) acknowledge and imply that it will become ready at some point. Or not? Furthermore, like how do you reconcile this with Fedora’s ambitions for Fedora Atomic? Or how NixOS is going strong (perhaps stronger than ever) while it’s been in the making since before Ubuntu?
And advantages*. Or do you ignore those?
This is false. What makes you think that?
What’s “them” in this sentence? The “old PCs” you had just mentioned? Or something else? Furthermore, if it is the “old PCs”, doesn’t this directly contradict with “they are unsuitable for old PCs”?
You have entirely misunderstood or intentionally misconcepted my comment.
There is no philosophical side. I don’t believe in them getting very major on desktops and laptops. That’s it.
Yes but the hype should disappear a long time before it happens. And that’s what I meant by the bubble. It’s very hyped, misunderstood and misused thing now. It will go away and then immutable systems will find their niche or die out.
This looks like an attempt to start a fight or act like the aggressive part of the Nix community. I said immutable systems have advantages and disadvantages (in the next comment I think) but you either didn’t read or decided to just fight instead.
Dual system partitions and Flatpaks are both not great for machines that use HDDs.
Old PCs.
It doesn’t because Nix doesn’t have the just mentioned disadvantages of immutable systems. Idk why you misunderstood this but imo it seems suspicious of you.
Thank you for the quick reply!
Alright. Thanks for clarification. Does “getting very major” primarily apply to adoption rate amongst users? Or does it primarily take into account adoption rate amongst distros?
Clear. Thank you. In your view, how should they be understood and used?
I saw the part about advantages right after. However, I also noticed how the first disadvantage was written without nuance. The set of disadvantages and advantages that followed right afterwards was accompanied with “for some” (or something like that IIRC^[1]^). Therefore, to me at least, it seemed as if you meant that there were disadvantages overall. But some of these disadvantages may be perceived as advantageous to some. Which, I thought was perhaps more in line with the general outlook of your comment. Or at least, my understanding of it*.
HDDs in general are not great :P . But, “unsuitable” =/= “not great”. So, this does not justify the (previous) usage of “unsuitable”. So, do you still stand behind the earlier use of “unsuitable”?
Thank you for another clarification!
Interesting.
I just noticed that I read your “Nix” as “NixOS”. Which is blameworthy*. Uhmm…, so I have to ask for some (more) clarifications then 😜. Did you strictly mean Nix; i.e. the package manager and/or language? Or NixOS? According to you, does NixOS fall into Nix; i.e. simply the system that’s built on Nix?
Fam. Chill. Please. I don’t intend to antagonize or whatsoever 😅. Like, the (overwhelming) majority of my previous comment were queries for clarifications and questioned related to how I initially understood them. There’s no need to make it more than that 😉.
All in all, thank you for clarifying and answering almost anything I asked. However, the following (I believe) still requires some attention:
To clarify, from my understanding, it seems you regard/view ‘immutable distros’ at best as some niche. Which, to be fair, is absolutely fine. And perhaps you’re right; the future will tell. However, we know what Fedora intends for 2028; i.e. users of Fedora Atomic (and related ‘immutable’ projects led by Fedora) would constitute the majority of its user base. Furthermore, they’ve spoken since 2021 (IIRC) that Fedora Atomic (so likely Fedora Silverblue) will eventually become what people will install for Fedora Workstation. So, their ambition is clear. And their ambition contradicts with how you view it. How do you reconcile this with the fact that other distros (more often than not) join Fedora into whatever direction they depart? Examples of this include systemd, PulseAudio, PipeWire and some might even mention Flatpak and Wayland here.
OMG that’s a lot of comment lol. My brain is gonna melt when typing a reply to THIS in English. But I guess I can try.
Amongst users. It’s possible that every big and medium distro will have an immutable spin soon but it won’t be too popular.
I’m sorry but expressing my opinion on it greatly increases the chance of running out of energy which will make my speech absolutely illogical and ridiculous.
My brain always returns an “out of memory” error of the if/else solving module if I try to feed it this part so sorry if my response isn’t complete. I indeed made it look like the features of immutable distros are disadvantages to more people than they are advantages to. This is my opinion which might be biased since immutability goes totally against my workflow and the workflows I make for other people.
Worse for = not meant for; not meant for = unsuitable imo because there are just better options; this leads to worse = unsuitable. Maybe not completely unsuitable but at least definitely not good for.
You are welcome and thank you for not being toxic like at least approximately 2/3 of people on Lemmy (according to my not-so-accurate research).
Ok listen idk much about Nix ecosystem/infrastructure. I meant NixOS here. Sorry for the confusion. The habit of not including the “OS” ending comes from the Android community.
I’m sorry, mister/miss. My attitude to the society, people in general and Lemmy users is negative and suspicious by default. I have my reasons and, no matter how controversial it is, I’m not going to change it. Most of the people by far are bad and toxic so it’s ok to make this assumption the default. Again I’m sorry that this my assumption caused inconvenience for you.
It may not be a small niche but everything has a niche (even X11, Wayland, GNOME and Windows 10) so immutable distros can have a big one or a small one. As you said, future will tell. I don’t see them getting a large (more than 10-20% desktop Linux users) niche any time soon.
I don’t think it’s the case or at least I don’t have any information on it. Fedora just tries making new and very perspective stuff the first and the stuff always succeeded in the past. In the case of immutable distros, I feel like it’s gonna be some nice to watch chaos because new users will have to understand how to disable immutability to install drivers and fixes which means much more research (because most answers will just say “disable immutability for the directories that the fix needs” and the user will have no idea of any of that) and terminal commands. At the same time, immutable systems may be less suitable for advanced users who like tinkering. This makes a huge part o
Excellent reply! I appreciate it.
Yeah lol. I’m sure we’ll (somehow) manage.
Aight. Thanks for (yet) another clarification. I obviously think that ‘immutable’ distros will heavily influence the future of Linux. Heck, I wouldn’t be surprised if all big distros will default to becoming ‘immutable’. However, that version of an ‘immutable’ distro may not exist yet. FWIW, it’s also (somewhat) in-line with Lennart Poettering’s vision.
If anything, I’d love to read this. So please, whenever you feel like it, consider returning back on this.
Fair. If it isn’t too much of a trouble, could you elaborate on your workflow? Like, are you constantly installing new stuff?
I implore you to use other words going forward 😜. Perhaps I’m wrong, but to me, this seems like an example in which your ‘bias’ seeps through.
Don’t worry about the confusion 😉. But thanks for your consideration! However, if I understood you correctly, this implies that you don’t consider NixOS an ‘immutable’ distro. Or at least not representative of ‘immutable’ distros. If this assumption is correct, could you elaborate on why you think that’s the case?
No worries, fam. Again, I appreciate your consideration!
Interesting notion on niche. Which I don’t think is necessary unjustified*. Though I am having a hard time coming up with a definition to how I understood your understanding. I initially thought of “everything that’s not (necessarily) mainstream”. But if you mention Windows 10 as an example, then that can’t be it. Perhaps “use” or “preference”? Could you (perhaps) define what you mean with “niche”?
Thanks for being transparent! Consider looking into the earlier given examples. Perhaps it’s even noteworthy to name some of the competitors that have perished against the alternative: Wayland vs Mir, systemd vs Upstart, Flatpak vs Snap etc.
Interesting. So, do you pose (as an alternative) that merely the successful is adopted? So they didn’t necessarily follow whatever Fedora did, but Fedora just happened to be on the winning team. Hence, the winner takes all.
Btw, what do you mean with “very perspective stuff”?
On what ‘immutable distros’ is ‘immutability’ disa
My previous comment was perhaps too enthusiastic 😜 . I’d like to slim it down as follows:
To be absolutely clear, these notions are (almost) alien to me. I’ve only come across these with new users that had fallen for the (infamous) XY problem. But that’s not even remotely representative. Hence, would I be correct to assume that your understanding of ‘immutable’ distros is relatively shallow? Which, to be absolutely fair, is totally fine.
Though, the possibility exists that your understanding of “disable immutability” is correct, but this particular phrase happens to be misleading instead. Hence, could you perhaps elaborate on what you mean with “disable immutability”? Like, how does that look like on any ‘immutable’ distro you’re familiar with?
Thank you in advance 😊!
I am sorry, mister/miss. Something weird happened to my Lemmy account and it was inaccessible for 2 days.
Immutable distros are good for cases when the machine is meant to be used for very specific tasks and applications while maintaining extreme stability and ease of updating. This includes OSes for ATMs, machinery control panels, enterprise office computers with very strict policies, educational computer class devices. I am not sure whether they are good for critical infrastructure such as aerospace industry and on-board computers so I can’t comment on that and it’s too early to do so anyways. Immutable systems can also be used for regular modern workspaces if stability (and possibly security) are preferred over absolutely everything else.
For me an “immutable distro” is defined more by its read-only (or R/W with write being disabled by default) root file system than by reproducibility or any other stuff. Afaik NixOS does not use any form of read-only FS so that’s why it is not an immutable distro to me.
No matter how good your distro is, there always will be new users that need fixes or customizations that require extra steps and research on immutable (as in my definition) distros. This increases the chance of them giving up on Linux or creating angry/toxic posts on Linux related websites and communities.
“Disable immutability” means “allow persistent changes for files and directories located in specific directories that are not in the /home directory/partition (“read-only” directories)”.
Thank you. Thank you.
No worries, fam 😉.
I think we very much agree on this. I am actually surprised 😜. Perhaps we (possibly) only ‘disagree’ on the following:
I actually even agree with this. But, and here it comes, you limit the use of ‘immutable systems’ when it comes to regular workspaces to just a subset that complies with “if stability (and possibly security) are preferred over absolutely everything else”. However, I’d argue it will soon become the preferred model for most people; simply because I’d argue the net positives dramatically outweigh the (diminishing) net negatives. And this ‘clash’ in perspectives is literally a philosophical/ideological one. Which, I actually tried to allude to in my very first comment. Btw, neither of us is right or wrong; as mentioned earlier, only time will tell.
Alright. So, you prefer to refer to ‘immutable’ distro in the literal sense.
Regarding the status of the read-only (or disabled R/W) root file system, does this have to apply to the complete root file system; i.e. absolute? Or does it suffice if only a select subset of the system is read-only (or disabled R/W)?I wanted to ask this, but later on you made clear that a system does not have to be completely and absolutely immutable for it to be considered immutable; a couple of read-only directories suffices.Furthermore, is it required that an immutable system should remain immutable at all times for it to be considered an immutable system; i.e. changes are not allowed besides ‘hacks’? Or is it perhaps possible for a system to be deemed immutable if it only possesses immutability during runtime?
Thanks in advance for yet another set of clarifications 😜!
Teaser; the Nix Store, i.e.
/nix/store, is immutable.Very interesting. So, on Fedora Atomic,
rpm-ostree install <package>would be considered “disable immutability”. Right? But, this does not apply toflatpak install <package>. Right?To be clear, new users will most likely experience some issues on Linux for the time being. I don’t think that ‘immutable’ distros are immune to that. Nor do I think they’re particularly more troublesome. If anything, they allow for more stable experiences overall; which you seem to allude to as well.
Idk if it changes anything but in that part of my comment the word “workspace” should’ve been replaced by “workstation”. I guess I chose a wrong word in autocorrect.
I think you have misunderstood my reply a lot. An immutable system is when everything (or almost everything) except for /home is read-only. Idk if my English was an issue there but it looks like you understood that part completely upside down.
Probably. Idk anything about ostree. What I meant is that if you want to manually edit a file anywhere except for /home (or do any manual changes to the system like installing a GTK theme), you have to run a command (I forgot which one) to disable immutability for the directory it’s in (or only for the file; I don’t remember). For new users it can be a problem because it may be hard for them to find a good tutorial that covers all the steps, especially at the start of the “immutability boom” if it’s ever going to happen.
As I just said, more stability means that issues are more stable and hard to solve as well.
Quick reply. Awesome!
Nope, it doesn’t. But thanks for clarifying!
Interesting. Here’s the thing; I am unaware of any so-called ‘immutable distro’ that fits this definition/description/notion/idea/understanding of an immutable system. So…, where do we go from here?
In retrospect, I think you actually did an okay-job at explaining your thoughts. But, yes; I did indeed misunderstand. Thanks for clarifying!
In Fedora Atomic, most of
/usris immutable. IIRC, this is even the only directory (combined with the sub-directories found within) that are immutable. However, the commandrpm-ostree install <package>allows the user to install packages into/usr. However, this change doesn’t happen during runtime. Instead, a new image/deployment is created with the newly installed package that you can access after a (soft-)reboot (or with–apply-liveif you like to live on the edge).Based on this, does this still apply as “disabling immutability”?
This seems to be based on your own experience. If so, would you be so kind to inform me on which distro this was?
Currently, apart from the documentation provided by uBlue and Guix, there’s definitely a lack of good resources for ‘immutable’ distros. That’s simply a fact. But, thankfully, this is not a problem by design; we just need people that are willing to put in the effort.
Sorry, I’m having a hard time understanding this. Could you perhaps provide an example of this from e.g. Debian? It can be any distro that’s regarded as ‘stable’*.
Unless I’m wrong, you seem to have missed the following. It would be awesome if you could touch upon these as well:
Thanks in advance 😊!
WOW, I just noticed something. You’ve been using the term “immutable system” for quite some time. And, I’ve primarily been using the term ‘immutable’ distro.
This is enough to cause most of the issues.
Not really because this is a pre-installed tool that doesn’t require any hassle to get working.
It wasn’t my experience. I’ve never tried an immutable distro myself because it goes against my personal preferences and needs. I saw that on YouTube. I don’t remember what distro it was unfortunately but I’m almost sure it was Fedora based. Also in case you didn’t know, GTK themes are usually installed in /usr/share/themes so disabling immutable is required to do so even if /usr is the only thing that’s immutable.
Sure but this excuse won’t help new users and won’t stop them turning away from Linux.
I meant the disadvantages of immutable systems here, not stability in general.
I have no idea what a runtime is so I can’t answer this question.
I use the term “immutable system” because someone can create an immutable fork of BSD or even Windows can become immutable. It’s not just about Linux.
You’re on fire, fam! Thank you for another quick one.
Before moving on, I want to make clear that I should correct some of my earlier statements. It probably doesn’t matter, but for sake of completeness.
What I describe above is not meant for immutable systems, but for ‘immutable’ distros.
I didn’t imply otherwise 😜. I was just explaining how immutability works on Fedora Atomic.
Excellent. I agree. So, “disabling immutability” therefore only applies to ‘hacks’. Right?
Thanks for being transparent! I also appreciate you sticking to your values.
I knew this (and also how
~/.local/share/themescould be utilized for this). But, fair; this is indeed something that Fedora Atomic’s old model didn’t allow. Or, at best, very ‘hacky’. Like, it’s basically not intended for the end-user to put stuff in here. Fedora Atomic’s new OCI-enabled model does allow this. But, yeah…; we ain’t (necessarily) here to discuss implementations. Fact of the matter and the issue at hand is that traditional distros don’t deal with issues like these. Right?IMO, if a new user wants to use an ‘immutable’ distro, then they should just use one of uBlue’s images. They’re like the Linux Mint or Zorin or Pop!_OS of immutable distros. And, as previously mentioned, uBlue’s documentation is at least sufficient. Traditional Linux distros are not to blame if a new user breaks their Manjaro installation. Similarly, ‘immutable’ distros are not to blame if a new user breaks their not newbie-friendly ‘immutable’ distro.
I think I got you now. Like with the previously mentioned issue with placing themes inside the
/usr/share/themesdirectory; on any traditional distro, you’d be free to place it there and you wouldn’t even have noticed a thing. While some 'immutable’ distros, like Fedora Atomic, make this hard. Do you think I understood you correctly?The expression “during runtime” is used to express a running and/or currently in use system. So, if my device is off, then the expression “during runtime” does not apply. When I’m using the system or even if it’s just idling, then the expression “during runtime” does apply. However, it’s possible with Btrfs (and more sophisticated technologies) to create a partition/deployment/image on your disk that’s currently not running nor in use and which has some changes compared to your running system. Then, once again, the expression “during runtime” does not apply.
Perhaps, I could be even more elaborate. So, on the overwhelming majority of ‘immutable’ distros (Guix System and NixOS are literally the exception) that offer a built-in mechanic for installing packages to the immutable base system (like the aforementioned
rpm-ostreethat’s found on Fedora Atomic), the changes are not meant to be applied directly on the running system. So, for example, right afterrpm-ostree install emacs, I can’t just typeemacsin aIdk if everything can br called “hacks” but mostly yea.
I know but idk if GUI apps and extensions can see themes installed in ~/.local and how many installation guides tell about that method.
Idk how it works and how simple it is but gtk that.
Exactly.
But we’re talking about situation when user-friendly distros become immutable. If the user willingly chooses an advanced distro, it’s not the distro’s fault but, for example, you said that Fedora expects their immutable options to become mainstream. I know that Fedora and other immutable distros are often recommended for new users now. This means that the ones that recommend them consider them user-friendly. Imo this, as well as rumors about Canonical want to make Ubuntu Core the default desktop offering, destroys your point in the context of this discussion.
Yes that’s exactly what I’m talking about.
Thank you for the explanation. I appreciate it. And in this case I think my definition of immutability applies to these “runtime-immutable distros” too.
Another (but small) confusion point for new users.
I understand it.
Idk what to answer. Full or partial immutability, it still creates the same issues I described.
Thank you for being patient with me! And thank you for yet another set of clarifications!
I’ve used the term ‘hacks’ a couple of times without properly defining it. My bad. So, I’ve used it in the context of “doing things the unintended and/or unsupported way”.
They should.
Arch wiki states it and there’s no reason (in this case) to assume it won’t work. Furthermore, FWIW, the documentation on uBlue does discuss theming.
Currently, it involves creating your own image :P .
So, as just mentioned, it’s possible. But, it’s definitely more cumbersome than placing it in
/usr/share/themes.Are you referring to distros like Linux Mint, Pop!_OS and Zorin becoming immutable? While it’s definitely possible that I’ve alluded as such, I can’t recall it. Nor was I able to find it in my earlier writings. Could you explicitly state what you mean by this and when I’ve (at least) hinted at this?
If, by becoming mainstream, you mean that over half of Fedora’s user base will be using them, then yes.
If you meant uBlue images with “other immutable distros”, then I’m fine with this statement. However, if you meant other immutable distros, then I’d like to know which ones you meant. Furthermore, even Fedora’s own images are rarely recommended to new users. Generally, at least from what I’ve seen, Aurora, Bazzite and Bluefin (all three being uBlue image) are mentioned in these conversation. And, IMO, rightfully so.
Sorry. I lost you here. My bad. What’s my point in the context of this discussion?
At least the terminal output makes it very clear that a (soft-)reboot is required. I’ve honestly never seen anyone mention this, i.e. the need to (soft-)reboot for the changes to take effect, as something that leads to confusion. I do understand the frustration that follows from the act of (soft-)rebooting though :P .
Thanks once again for another lovely set of clarifications! Thank you in advance!
Tbh I am not sure anymore if you’re being serious in this discussion or just trolling because I explained some things very clearly but you still misunderstand them a lot. I’m not willing to continue this. I apologize if I’m not right but I have to stay away from trolls and other kinds of evil people.
Apologies if I made you feel that way! And thank you for vocalizing your concerns!
It has never been my intent to troll you. Nor have I got any other evil motives.
I noticed how you’ve been one of the more vocal community members to oppose ‘immutable distros’. And I, as a major supporter of ‘immutable’ distros, am very interested to know why that is. That’s basically the whole idea of this conversation. At least on my part*. And, to be honest, I think we’re almost done. There was only one paragraph from your earlier comment that I didn’t get. And all the questions I posed are from that paragraph.
So, to make it simpler, I first want to clarify the following statement of my own:
With this, I don’t mean that ‘immutable’ distros are (by definition) not newbie-friendly. That would be the complete opposite of what I’ve been saying this whole time :P . Instead, I posed that ‘immutable’ distros can be categorized in:
And, thus, my statement should be understood as: “The mishaps/inconveniences etc of not newbie-friendly distros, does not invalidate the existence of other ‘immutable’ distros that actually happen to be newbie-friendly. Hence, we shouldn’t throw out all ‘immutable’ distros with the babywater; this idiom is referenced.”
Finally, if you didn’t misunderstand my statement in the first place, then I would like you to explain/elaborate what you had written here:
That’s all. Thank you in advance!
My apologies for being persistent; I’m just very much saddened that the IMO great conversation abruptly ended when it was so close to resolution. Regardless, this will be my last attempt at engaging in hopes of continuing the earlier conversation. However, full disclosure, if you don’t respond, then I will leave you with a final message in which I will lay out what I got from this conversation and my overall view in regards to how it went etc.
So, without further a due.
I would like to cut the chase and be very direct:
/usr/share/themes, (soft-)reboot and find the theme in the designated folder. To me, it seems, as if you dismiss this possibility. If this is correct, why do you think that’s the case? Isn’t there more reason to be hopeful considering the mere fact that we’re currently able to apply tons of customization that were previously inconceivable?Unfortunately, you’ve yet to respond. Therefore, I was unable to verify everything mentioned below. Regardless, for the sake of completeness, I would like to give a brief overview of our interaction and how I have perceived it.
My intent regarding this conversation:
However, we weren’t able to get that far. This is IMO primarily due to the following:
The points you actually raised to discredit ‘immutable’ distros:
There is perhaps a lot more I could go over, but I’ll suffice with this for the sake of brevity.
NixOS not the major inspiration for immutables, consumer OSes like Android and ChromeOS are. But yes, NixOS has some influence even it don’t get the idea of immutable distros well.
Do you mean strictly mean ‘immutable’ distros with this?
So, if I understood you correct, you pose that Android and ChromeOS are the major inspiration for ‘immutable distros’. Which, to be fair, could be true. Uhmm…, a quick search didn’t result on any conclusive evidence of this. If you will, could you perhaps help me find with sources that back up this claim?
Sorry, I don’t understand this sentence. Could you explain what you meant here?
Yeah, Android ain’t an immutible distro wtf
It’s just a regular distro where the owner (Google) doesn’t tell you the root password.
This is the usual (only?) solution - the idea forks or inspires a different community to take it further.
There’s usually no fixing a toxic person / community in either real life or online.
Eelco stepped down
lol no insight at all
I believe there is a much larger, silent majority of nix users, contributors and enthusiasts that are not affected by this drama. Here’s a post that resonates with me: nrd.sh/blog/nixos-policy-breakdown/
Over 20 years in this technology space, I’ve come to recognize software built on very solid foundational concepts. Nix is one of those. It’s not going anywhere and neither is NixOS. I encourage anyone interested in Nix to read Eelco Dolstra’s thesis: edolstra.github.io/pubs/phd-thesis.pdf
That’s a thought-provoking article you linked. Thanks. Unfortunately, ideological purity testing is a major problem across all sectors and spans the political spectrum. I was particularly struck by the part of the article that discussed whether “marginalized” status should be considered permanent or temporary.
I’ve worked in social services for a long time. Social activism is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, marginalized groups need activists to push their agenda. On the other, activists often adopt that social activism as their primary identity and sometimes even their career. This sets up an incentive structure whereby they don’t actually want to solve the problem of marginalization. Instead, they focus on ideological purity rather than pragmatically solving whatever problems they face.
Sexual orientation, indigenous rights, trans rights, disability rights, race, gender, even recreational drug use, are all marginalization issues that have all received a reasonable degree of social acknowledgement and formal protection.
In all the years I’ve worked in social services, the one issue that never goes away and is never solved or even seriously tackled is the intersection of poverty and mental illness. We are getting better as a society with treatable mental illness like depression and anxiety. However, major mental illness or untreatable/undiagnosed conditions like lack of impulse control that make it hard or impossible to work lead almost inexorably to poverty, addiction, and involvement with the criminal justice system. The activism on that front is itself marginalized because the “fix” isn’t a matter of changing language or mind set, but rather a massive investment of resources. It is easier to sit behind a keyboard and advocate online for nebulous issues like representation than to get out there and make people care about issues that cost real money.
As someone who works with seriously impoverished and mentally ill people, I find the sometimes extreme drama associated with identity politics, representation, pronouns, etc. rather ridiculous. A lot of it is just people trying to externalize their personal issues and force others to acknowledge them, which is unfortunate when it poisons a project or community. It is a form of narcissism, essentially. People who do that should go down to the tent cities, homeless shelters, and jails to get some perspective on just how “marginalized” they actually are and whether publicly exorcising their personal demons is worth destroying the enjoyment of others in a project or community. Their energy could almost certainly be better spent in less narcissistic pursuits.
When I see posts like this and suggest keeping politics out of technical communities, my comment just gets removed by the mods for “transphobia”. I can’t even wrap my head around that one…
Other (multiple) times I’ve had different people respond with “a person’s right to exist is not a political issue, it’s a human rights issue”… as if I was ever talking about anyone’s right to exist.
Then I get the people who say that it’s impossible to not have politics in a community, as eventually someone will come along and do things like the SerenityOS drive-by PR and now any action or inaction by the owner that doesn’t fit their narrative is labeled as some kind of personal attack against them and they call on their friends to go full-on SJW war against the project because someone had an opinion they don’t like.
For you to understand: when you say “keep politics out of tech” that is an explicit political position and you are basically saying “politics for me, but not for you”. Or to put it in different terms: unspoken support for the status quo, is a deeply reactionary political position and you are trying to enforce this by “keeping politics out of tech”.
I disagree. But I think the overall intention with saying that is simply that we/I don’t want to have that discussion or it’s off-topic/not the right place. I guess that could be said instead although I doubt it would really make much difference. People will still find a way to complain and boycott even if you do nothing i.e. “silence is violence”.
I think a lot of people will simply stay away from your project if you invite that kind of discussion, regardless of who is right or wrong. More people than might otherwise be attracted by arguably more explicit and inclusive stances.
The funny part is that you forget or ignore the fact that human rights is a political issue, thus the right to exist is political.
I wasn’t the one who said that, but I agree with you.
To be fair, one person’s “politics” is another person’s life. When you say “politics” in the sense and context we have here, what does it really mean? It probably means something like “controversial topics related to gender, race, or sexual preference”. When you think of it that way, it is easy to see that excluding discussion of these topics could be seen as excluding or devaluing people with non-mainstream characteristics. An example of that would be the “Don’t Say Gay” law in Florida, or the US military’s “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” policy whereby they would allow homosexuals in the military as long as they kept quiet about it.
However, those conversations can be delicate and fraught, so I can see why many people want to keep them to a minimum in certain communities. I have a lot of sympathy for mods that have to moderate such conversations. In general, though, I don’t think it makes sense to remove comments or people unless they are clearly malicious. There are plenty of people for whom topics related to identity are alien or controversial or too painful and personal. Simply calling people “sealions” or “concern trolls” or “transphobic” or whatever and removing them from the conversation is not only wrong, but counter-productive, in my humble opinion. I think the vast majority of people come to conversations with good intentions, but different levels of knowledge, conflict tolerance, and interest in perceived off-topic digressions.
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There’s some decent forks currently so I wouldn’t worry about the technology, but yeah the organisation is probably going to implode and reorg soon
You should know that the guy you cited in the second link, Srid, is a well-known right-wing shit-stirrer who is banned from basically all NixOS spaces because he cannot peacefully coexist. He literally gets up day after day with the seemingly sole purpose of fueling drama and causing problems. Don’t take his opinion at face value, he wants to see the project burn down and this colors his interpretation of events.
NixOS is going through a rocky moment for sure, but there’s no indication it will implode currently.
Thank you for mentioning who he is and what his goals are!
which is hilarious because any time I make comments like that, they get removed.
That’s funny because I feel like that’s exactly what all these self-proclaimed “gender terrorist” SJWs are doing to projects in the first place.
Why the whataboutism?
I had to look up what that word means. It sounds like calling something whataboutism could itself be considered whataboutism. Anyways, I was merely making an observation with no ulterior motive, I was not trying to discredit or shift any focus away from the original argument. Apologies if that wasn’t clear.
You made one reply to me whining that I attacked the person by pointing out his beliefs, and then made another reply to me about “gender terrorist SJWs”. Do you just lack any form of self-awareness?
I think we should attack the arguments made and not the people, seems a bit hypocritical IMO.
I attacked his beliefs which is perfectly valid. You should critically examine the motives and biases of people who feed you information.
I am critically examining your responses and I believe that you are making personal attacks.
Criticizing people’s past and current actions relating to the subject and bringing up their direct history relavent to the subject is not a personal attack, nor is it out of line to point out he does his to advance his political agenda within the project, which is why he got banned in the first place. All of this directly relates to the subject at hand.
You know what doesn’t relate to the subject at hand? Your random little “sjw gender terrorists” comment. But it does make it rather clear why you want to obfuscate the facts about Srid’s history with the project, subsequent ban, and continued amplification of drama and general shit-stirring ever since.
My take on it is that the creator of Nix was very good technically but was not a good BDFL, and that was the root of the problem. He didn’t do a good job of politicking, stepped down, and now Nix is going through a bit of interregnum. I don’t think it’s likely to fail overall though, nixpkgs is too valuable of a resource to just get abandoned. I expect the board seats will be filled by people that know how to politick, and things will continue on after that.
Lessons learned is being a BDFL is hard. IMO Eelco Dolstra failed because he had opinions about things like Anduril sponsorship and flakes, and didn’t just declare “This is the way things are going to be, take it or leave it”. People got really pissed off because there wasn’t a clear message or transparency, which resulted in lots of guessing.
IMO politics have no place in technical discussions. Full disclosure, the last time I said this, my comment was removed for “transphobia”… somehow.
What you call politics (US political “issues”) and politicking (the act of seeking and organizing power or influence) are different things.
Maybe US political issues have no spot in tech but politics are a part of being human.
Exactly, thanks. “politicking” != US political issues
Building an open source project is not just a technical challenge. It’s a social one as well, and politics are a big factor in that.
Thank you for your input! I would love to read more on this. Do you happen to know a good source wherein Eelco Dolstra’s leadership is discussed (as fair as possible)?
Unfortunately there isn’t one easy source that I’ve found. This is based on reading the stuff you linked to, as well as discourse/matrix discussions linked to from those sources. I compare it mentally to Guido van Rossum as BDFL of Python (though not any longer). He did a much better job of communicating expectations, like here
<img alt="" src="https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/72462884-be00-46d1-86d0-f723783d23fd.png">
It made some people unhappy that there was no Python 2.8, but everybody knew what was happening. The core Python team also wasn’t surprised by that announcement, unlike with stuff like Anduril or flakes for the nix devs.
There was also a failure to communicate with stuff like the PR that would switch to Meson. The PR author should have known if Eelco broadly agreed with it before opening it. If there was a process that the PR author just ignored, the PR should have been closed with “Follow this process and try again”. That process can be as simple as “See if Eelco likes it”, since he was BDFL, but the process needs to be very clear to everyone.
Thank you for your insights! I appreciate it!
Doesnt matter because all the board members could quit and nixOS community can update the config and rebuild.
I don’t know what drama NixOS is having but I rather read TOS than reading that giant wall of text, so NixOS is clean in my eyes