nix-config

My nixos and home-manager configuration files

This readme file is a work in progress

Install Nixos

First, close the default installer, then open gparted and configure it like so

In GParted, Create gpt partition table in this format:

Note: Use gnome-disks if you wish to use disk encryption and secure boot. GParted may still be necessary to add labels to the disks.

name	file system	label	flags	size
boot	fat32	BOOT	boot esp	512MiB
swap	linux-swap	swap	swap	Check https://help.ubuntu.com/community/SwapFaq for the size
nixos	btrfs/ext4	nixos		whatever is remaining

Note: Sometimes btrfs won't work after installed (or a rebuild will fail). In that case, reinstall with ext4

# Start root shell
sudo su -

# mount disks
mount /dev/disk/by-label/nixos /mnt # mount the root
mkdir -p /mnt/boot/efi # create boot and efi mount point
mount /dev/disk/by-label/BOOT /mnt/boot/efi # mount efi partition

# If the host has the secure boot enabled, run the following to generate the boot loader signing keys
nix run nixpkgs#sbctl create-keys -- --database-path /mnt/etc/secureboot --export /mnt/etc/secureboot/keys

# install nixos pointing to the flake
# new root password will be asked in the end
nixos-install --flake github:viniciussalvati/nix-config\#{host}

# sets the user password, so we don't have to after the boot
nixos-enter --command 'passwd vinicius'

reboot

See extra instructions in system-security for extra steps to secure the system.

Install home-manager

• Install nix according to your system. See the website for instructions.
• Enter a shell with git, if necessary, with: nix-shell -p git.
• Enter this repository and run

  nix run --experimental-features 'nix-command flakes pipe-operators' '.#homeConfigurations.{profile}.activationPackage'

• Run the following method, if the profile you picked needs it.

    nix run '.?submodules=1#homeConfigurations.wsl-work.activationPackage'

Private

There are some configurations that I want to keep private, for example, work related stuff (nothing like api keys, passwords, etc.) that I don't know if I want to be in a public repo.

Because of that, I have created a private repo in github, and added it as a submodule in this repo.

Available Machines

vm

This is a config for a vm created in Boxes (probably qemu). It works with the default config. Swap size depends on the allocated memory to the VM.

nixos-acer

This is my Acer machine. And there are some quirks to it:

• The machine came with an ESP partition for Windows, but it's too small, so I decided to create a BOOT EFI partition and installed the boot loader there
• I used grub version 2 for it, because I needed it to find the Windows bootable binary in the ESP binary.
• I had to use ext4, because some nixos commands were failing after install if I used btrfs
• I used 20GB for the swap

Profiles

Profiles are meant for machines with other distros that use standalone home-manager

wsl-work

The configuration I use for work. This one includes the private configurations.

Specific instructions

• Disk Encryption and Secure Boot
• Graphics cards
• Gaming