Название: NixOS in Production: The NixOS handbook for professional use ONLY
Автор: Gabriella Gonzalez
Издательство: Leanpub
Год: 2023-03-12
Язык: английский
Формат: pdf (true), mobi, epub
Размер: 10.09 MB

Want to use NixOS "for real" at work? Interested in learning one of the hottest emerging DevOps technologies? Jumpstart your professional career by reading this book authored by a professional user of NixOS.

NixOS is a Linux distribution built on top of the Nix package manager. It uses declarative configuration and allows reliable system upgrades. This book is a guide to using NixOS in production, where NixOS is an operating system built on top of the Nix package manager. This guide assumes that you have some familiarity with NixOS, so if you have never used NixOS before and you’re looking for a tutorial or introduction then this book might not be for you. Some chapters may review basic concepts, but in general they will not be written for a beginner audience.

I’m writing this book because I cultivated years of professional experience doing all of the above, back when no such resource existed. I learned NixOS the hard way and I’m writing this book so that you don’t have to make the same mistakes I did. Currently, most educational resources for NixOS (including the NixOS manual) are written with desktop users in mind, whereas I view NixOS as far better suited as a production operating system. This book attempts to fill that documentation gap by catering to professional NixOS users instead of hobbyists.

This sort of feature-oriented description explains what NixOS does, but does not quite explain what NixOS is for. What sort of useful things can you do with NixOS? When is NixOS the best solution? What types of projects, teams, or organizations should prefer using NixOS over other the alternatives?
Come to think of it, what are the alternatives? Is NixOS supposed to replace Debian? Or Docker? Or Ansible? Or Vagrant? Where does NixOS fit in within the modern software landscape?

In the Chapter 1 I’ll help you better understand when you should recommend NixOS to others and (just as important!) when you should gently nudge people away from NixOS. Hopefully this chapter will improve your overall understanding of NixOS’s “niche”. The title of this book might have tipped you off that I will endorse NixOS for use as a server operating system rather than a desktop operating system.

This book is a guide to using NixOS in production that will help you answer the following questions:

- What real-world use cases does NixOS address better than the alternatives?
- What does a mature NixOS enterprise look like?
- How do I smoothly migrate an organization to adopt NixOS?
- What potential pitfalls of NixOS should I be mindful to avoid?
- How can I effectively support and debug NixOS when things go wrong?

I'm writing this book because I cultivated years of professional experience doing all of the above, back when no such resource existed. I learned NixOS the hard way and I'm writing this book so that you don't have to make the same mistakes I did.