nathan/nixpkgs
1
0
Fork 0
mirror of https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs.git synced 2026-06-05 21:03:40 +00:00
Code Issues Packages Projects Releases Wiki Activity

doc/using/configuration: document NIXPKGS_CONFIG lookup order

Browse Source 
The NIXPKGS_CONFIG environment variable and the system-wide
/etc/nix/nixpkgs-config.nix path used by NixOS were undocumented in
the Nixpkgs manual; the only mention was a release-note from 2006.
Add a short paragraph to the Global configuration chapter describing
the lookup order, the NixOS-specific default, and the limitation
that the file is not generated automatically.

Closes #28085.
This commit is contained in:
Aliaksandr
2026-05-09 17:49:31 +03:00
parent fada675d5d
commit 39f064f0e3
1 changed files with 16 additions and 0 deletions
Download Patch File Download Diff File Expand all files Collapse all files

16
doc/using/configuration.chapter.md
View File

@@ -31,6 +31,22 @@ Unfree software is not tested or built in Nixpkgs continuous integration, and th
Most unfree licenses prohibit either executing or distributing the software.
:::
The `NIXPKGS_CONFIG` environment variable can override the configuration file location.
Nixpkgs resolves the config in this order:
1. `$NIXPKGS_CONFIG`, if set and the file exists.
2. `~/.config/nixpkgs/config.nix`, if it exists.
3. `~/.nixpkgs/config.nix` (legacy), if it exists.
4. Empty configuration.
On NixOS, `NIXPKGS_CONFIG` points to `/etc/nix/nixpkgs-config.nix` system-wide.
Drop a file there to apply configuration to `nix-env`, `nix-shell`, and other user-level commands.
NixOS does not create this file.
The [`nixpkgs.config`](https://nixos.org/manual/nixos/stable/options#opt-nixpkgs.config) option does not affect `nix-env`, `nix-shell`, or other user-level commands.
This lookup applies to non-flake usage like channels and `<nixpkgs>`.
Flakes ignore it; pass `config` directly when importing `nixpkgs`.
## Installing broken packages {#sec-allow-broken}
There are several ways to try compiling a package which has been marked as broken.