nix-init

Generate Nix packages from URLs

Note: It is likely that the generated package will not work without some tweaks, also remember to double check the license and description even if it does work

• Hash prefetching powered by nurl with support for cargoHash and vendorHash
• Dependency inference for Rust, Go, and Python projects
• Interactive prompts with fuzzy tab completions
• License detection

Installation

The latest release of nix-init is packaged in nixpkgs and kept up to date on the unstable branches

If you want to use a more recent snapshot of nix-init, it is also available as a flake. The following command is equivalent to running nix-init --help:

nix run github:nix-community/nix-init -- --help

or if you don't have flakes enabled:

nix run --extra-experimental-features "flakes nix-command" github:nix-community/nix-init -- --help

Usage

Usage: nix-init [OPTIONS] [OUTPUT]

Arguments:
  [OUTPUT]  The path or directory to output the generated file to

Options:
  -u, --url <URL>                    Specify the URL
      --rev <REV>                    Specify the tag or revision
  -S, --submodules[=<SUBMODULES>]    Always fetch submodules when possible [possible values: true, false]
  -V, --version [<VERSION>]          Specify the version of the package, or print nix-init version if no arguments are present
      --pname <PNAME>                Specify the pname
      --builder <BUILDER>            Specify the builder
      --cargo-vendor <CARGO_VENDOR>  Specify how the cargo dependencies are vendored [possible values: fetchCargoVendor, importCargoLock]
  -y, --overwrite[=<OVERWRITE>]      Always overwrite files [possible values: true, false]
      --headless                     Don't prompt for anything (requires --url)
  -n, --nixpkgs <NIXPKGS>            Path to nixpkgs (in nix)
  -C, --commit[=<COMMIT>]            Commit the changes if the output path is name-based (RFC 140) [possible values: true, false]
  -c, --config <CONFIG>              Specify the config file
  -h, --help                         Print help (see more with '--help')

Supported builders

• stdenv.mkDerivation and stdenvNoCC.mkDerivation
• buildRustPackage
• buildPythonApplication and buildPythonPackage
• buildGoModule
• buildNpmPackage

Supported fetchers

• fetchCrate
• fetchFromGitHub
• fetchFromGitLab
• fetchFromGitea
• fetchPypi
• All other fetchers supported by nurl are also supported, you just have to manually input the tag/revision of the package

Configuration

nix-init will try to find nix-init/config.toml under XDG configuration directories

# ~/.config/nix-init/config.toml

# maintainers that will get added to the package meta
maintainers = ["figsoda"]

# path to nixpkgs (in nix), equivalent to `--nixpkgs`
nixpkgs = "<nixpkgs>" # use the nixpkgs from channels (default)
# nixpkgs = 'builtins.getFlake "nixpkgs"' # use the nixpkgs from the flake registry

# commit the changes if the output path is name-based (RFC 140)
# see https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/tree/master/pkgs/by-name for more information
commit = true

# access tokens to access private repositories and avoid rate limits
[access-tokens]
"github.com" = "ghp_blahblahblah..."
"gitlab.com".command = ["secret-tool", "or", "whatever", "you", "use"]
"gitlab.gnome.org".file = "/path/to/api/token"

# if unspecified, nix-init tries to format the output file with nixfmt if it's found in PATH
# the formatter should take a Nix file from stdin and output the formatted file to stdout
[format]
command = ["alejandra"]

Changelog

See CHANGELOG.md