Re: A certain new commiter
Hi Hilton, Am Sonntag, dem 20.08.2023 um 01:40 +0800 schrieb Hilton Chain: > Hello Guix, > > With the commit [1] made hours ago, I have been granted commit access > to Guix repository. Congratulations. > Currently, I'm maintaining packages I may use and those I've touched, > and for now I have no specific plan to move on. This means I can > have more time to go through the review process, and I'm glad to do > so. Go ahead and take it easy. Just don't start a fight with the Roman Catholic Church on behalf of the British Royal Family over an anthropomorphized index of forbidden magical spells. Cheers Liliana
Re: A certain new commiter
That's awesome, Congratulations! Hilton Chain writes: > [[PGP Signed Part:Undecided]] > Hello Guix, > > With the commit [1] made hours ago, I have been granted commit access > to Guix repository. > > Currently, I'm maintaining packages I may use and those I've touched, > and for now I have no specific plan to move on. This means I can have > more time to go through the review process, and I'm glad to do so. > > I'm also hako on libera.chat, please contact me if there's anything I > can help with. > > Thanks, > Hilton Chain > > --- > This mail is signed by the key with the following fingerprint, I'll > use it for commit signing: > F4C2 D1DF 3FDE EA63 D1D3 0776 ACC6 6D09 CA52 8292 > > The signing key is a subkey of > 220F 98D9 5E86 204C 0036 DA7B 6DEC 4360 408B 4185 > > , which is attached. And it can be found in [2] as well. > > [1]: > https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/guix.git/commit/?id=85dbe6d13f20b884f343032e5d1829cc0ef9000d > > [2]: > https://savannah.gnu.org/users/hako > https://keys.openpgp.org/vks/v1/by-fingerprint/220F98D95E86204C0036DA7B6DEC4360408B4185 > > [2. application/pgp-keys]... > > [[End of PGP Signed Part]] -- Retrieve my PGP public key: gpg --recv-keys B3EBC086AB0EBC0F45E0B4D433DB374BCEE4D9DC Zihao signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: A certain new commiter
Hilton Chain writes: > Hello Guix, > > With the commit [1] made hours ago, I have been granted commit access > to Guix repository. > > Currently, I'm maintaining packages I may use and those I've touched, > and for now I have no specific plan to move on. This means I can have > more time to go through the review process, and I'm glad to do so. > > I'm also hako on libera.chat, please contact me if there's anything I > can help with. > Welcome, and happy hacking! 拾 Thanks.
A certain new commiter
Hello Guix, With the commit [1] made hours ago, I have been granted commit access to Guix repository. Currently, I'm maintaining packages I may use and those I've touched, and for now I have no specific plan to move on. This means I can have more time to go through the review process, and I'm glad to do so. I'm also hako on libera.chat, please contact me if there's anything I can help with. Thanks, Hilton Chain --- This mail is signed by the key with the following fingerprint, I'll use it for commit signing: F4C2 D1DF 3FDE EA63 D1D3 0776 ACC6 6D09 CA52 8292 The signing key is a subkey of 220F 98D9 5E86 204C 0036 DA7B 6DEC 4360 408B 4185 , which is attached. And it can be found in [2] as well. [1]: https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/guix.git/commit/?id=85dbe6d13f20b884f343032e5d1829cc0ef9000d [2]: https://savannah.gnu.org/users/hako https://keys.openpgp.org/vks/v1/by-fingerprint/220F98D95E86204C0036DA7B6DEC4360408B4185 binyvENulr2vq.bin Description: application/pgp-keys pgpPQLSGjBXn7.pgp Description: OpenPGP Digital Signature
Re: Guix / Nix Benchmarks
Hi, On Mon, 19 Jun 2023 at 14:54, Nicolas Graves via "Development of GNU Guix and the GNU System distribution." wrote: > One of the criticism that can be read online about Guix (compared to > Nix) is its speed. I have never tried Nix and probably won't in a near > future, but I was wondering if some work has been made to compare them > on basic tasks (package installation, removal...) (the reason why I ask > is to be able to give an honest answer to someone hesitating between > both). I would find that very helpful. For some command, I find Guix very slow, especially when compared with Apt or Aptitude from Debian. But that is comparing Apple to Orange. :-) For sure, “guix search” is very slow [1]. 1: https://issues.guix.gnu.org/39258 Cheers, simon
Re: Status? [PATCH 0/1] guix: pack: add --entry-point-argument option
Hi, On Tue, 08 Aug 2023 at 14:52, Graham Addis wrote: > Do we have a timeframe as to when this is likely to be incorporated? Well, I think it’s on the road… :-) Thanks for this contribution. Cheers, simon
Re: A Forum for Guix Users
Hi Étienne, On Mon, 17 Jul 2023 at 10:58, "Etienne B. Roesch" wrote: > The way I use the doc, is by loading the latest manual in the browser as > one page, and use the search function of the browser. That helps but it > also implies I know what I am looking for, and I can fill in the gaps, eg > about context (guix system vs host). Well, I think many of us are doing the same. :-) > I don’t think we necessarily need another outlet, and should maybe just > consolidate what we have. I agree. In order to fill the gaps between the manual and where the beginner is, I think we need tutorials. Plural because a tutorial needs to be adapted, depending on the background. For example, I did a first attempt (in French): https://zimoun.gitlab.io/jres22-tuto-guix/support-notes-additionnelles.pdf Somehow, I think that the missing is practical examples opening the doors to Guix concept. For example, in the previous tutorial, I try to explain what a profile is: the idea was to (1) to feed the concept in order to being able to understand the various mentions in the manual and (2) let the audience connect with what they already know (Conda environment, etc.). Well, it’s far to be satisfying but that an attempt. :-) Other examples I find very helpful are “Dissecting Guix”. Well, they are core concepts and these concepts are not required by newcomers. However, I think that is the sort of missing material: digest of explanations about Guix concept. The manual is complete but intimidating, IMHO. What is missing appears to me sort of Rosetta stones which are self-consistent digest of some specific Guix concept. For example, https://hpc.guix.info/blog/2023/06/a-guide-to-reproducible-research-papers/ is great. Now, each step could lead dedicated posts explaining technical bits. Because, from my experience, what is missing is the ingredients for fixing the issues when applying such guide to user’s use-cases. And to acquire the knowledge of such ingredients, one needs to connect the dot with Guix concepts. Well, for what my opinion is worth. Cheers, simon
Re: A Forum for Guix Users
Hi, On Tue, 18 Jul 2023 at 06:45, Distopico wrote: > - Forum: A good place for beginner an non-technical user (I guess all > Guix user require some technical knowledge), also a good place for > create history and user documentation/solutions. > - Mailing List: For contributors, developers, and more long-terms > questions, as well more advanced users. Please do not take me wrong because my message could appear “elitist”. I hope I have a track record about welcoming newcomers, answering on help-guix mailing and helping on various other forums or media. Well, GNU Guix is currently a technical project and any user will have their hand dirty. If you are non-technical and not able to deal with emails, then sadly GNU Guix is not for you. My point of view is: a forum will not help in a better way the newcomers. Moreover, the maintenance cost of such forum is not free. You speak about history but most forums are ephemeral because they are based on kid-cool web tech, and to my knowledge, mailing list preserves much better the history. Even, most of the help provided by answering to a question is also ephemeral. I am very doubtful about the value in history for most of the question/answers. As an exercise, for instance, none of any messages from December 2016 [1] seems helpful for today troubles. And you can pick any other past months. If we want to help newcomer, then, IMHO, the best is to extract the rare “universal-enough” question/answer and pinpoint them – for instance, improve the documentation (manual or cookbook). Maybe, I am wrong… My point is that forum + mailing lists will scatter where people who answer have to look. And you cannot know in advance if the question will become a long-term question. In that rare case, I do not speak about the discoverability of such configuration using forum + mailing lists. That’s said, some people are not going via “official” media for reporting difficulties and asking help. Instead, they are using stuff like Reddit, Stackoverflow and the like. And as experimented users, in to order to strengthen the community, we should roam on these platforms (quickly answer and/or friendly redirect to “official” media if needed). Last, I advocate for using the most sober technology for exchanging pieces of text and not require the most modern hardware and/or some resource-hungry software (client and server) that many forums implicitly require. An example: try to follow Discourse (e.g., https://discuss.ocaml.org) forum with few-featured Web-browser or even try to deal with it with intermittent internet connection. 1: https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/help-guix/2016-12/threads.html > on the other hand I think that the mailing lists create a more conducive > environment for debate than the forum itself, but again, for new user a > Forum is a better place or to find quick solutions which on Irc are hard > to find. I concur at some points. However, I disagree with the proposal that a new forum would be the answer. From my point of view, we should keep the “official” interaction as it is using mailing lists and we need to, time to time, roam on already existing well-known forums instead of creating yet another dedicated space. (Here, I speak about GNU Guix. My answer is different for specific usage of Guix in some context as in scientific research because, although hacker and researcher communities can be joined as it had been done in 10 Years of Guix [2], these both communities have subtle differences. :-)) 2: 10years.guix.gnu.org/ Cheers, simon
Re: Can ALPS be included in the Guix repo? The question is about the licenses.
Hi, On Sun, 13 Aug 2023 at 17:31, Efraim Flashner wrote: > Placing the limitation of 'academic and non-commercial' the license is > non-free and cannot be included in Guix proper. If something depends on > it that you're looking to upstream it'll need to be buildable without > that library. > > I apologize for being the bearer of sad news. Not in Guix proprer because the license is not compliant but maybe this kind of contribution could be welcome to the channel guix-science, https://github.com/guix-science/guix-science or at worse guix-science-nonfree. Cheers, simon
Re: A Forum for Guix Users
Hi, On Thu, 13 Jul 2023 at 19:22, Sarthak Shah wrote: > I think we should seriously consider having a user forum similar to > Debian's User Forum or Nixos' Discourse. Well, I shared my opinion in the other thread: A Forum for Guix Users from Distopico Tue, 18 Jul 2023 06:45:16 -0500 https://yhetil.org/guix/87bkg9wigq@riseup.net with my message 86a5unz4ap@gmail.com. And to be explicit: do not count on me for interacting with Discourse. For two reasons: 1. Because I have never find the way to deal with it with intermittent internet connection. How do you deal with such forum in batch-mode? More than often, I process (read and/or answer) the volume of Guix messages off-line. As I am doing right now. :-) For example, before going to somewhere without internet connection (meeting or else) and because I know that I will have some slots of free time (boring meeting or else), well I just fetch the last messages, and then I process the messages. Once back to some internet connection, I send all my replies. Without that batch-mode feature, I would not just read most of the messages and probably I would never answer. For example, today I am not following Haskell or OCaml or Python because Discourse forces me the way of interaction. Well, because I find that way so boring: open my web-browser, click, no filter, etc., I am scrolling only the Discourse of OCaml once per month or so. Maybe I have missed the offline procedure because I have not checked Discourse features since last months (years?). 2. Because I find insane to have such resource-hungry client/server configuration for only exchanging small pieces of text. Instead of calling to require more for doing the same (or sometimes even less) but using more resource, I am calling to the opposite: doing more with less. I strongly think we must collectively reflect on how to do using less. We have to drastically decrease the global CO2 footprint and every gram counts. Obviously, we have to be welcoming. For sure we have to think and re-think and think again and again about the best ways to be welcoming and helpful. However, I disagree that Discourse or similar will bring something on the table. Well, I will not bet that people currently helping in mailing lists would continue to provide answers using Discourse and I will not bet that instead new experienced users would answer to question on Discourse. There is a trade-off between newcomer’s expectations about the way to get help and experienced users who provide such help. I fear that switching to Discourse could indeed meet newcomer’s expectations but loosing those experienced users. Cheers, simon
Re: Guix and the developer ecosystem
Hi, Thanks for your feedback. On Wed, 26 Jul 2023 at 19:29, Distopico wrote: > So, in many cases, I haven't been able to fully integrate Guix into my > development workflow. I had to look for alternative ways outside Guix, > like Nix. > > I appreciate the simplicity of Guix, but let's say that Nix has a > developer-oriented approach and has become very popular among > programmers. Many projects now include default configurations for Nix in > their repositories. Hum, it seems an another issue about bootstrapping. ;-) Well, on one hand, Guix is missing some person-power. And on the other hand, this allows to easily contribute, somehow. Considering Haskell, the upstream community is putting their hands on Nix. For instance, people involved in GHC release management provide some Nix stuff [1]. Well, if you follow the Haskell community, maybe you know that some companies [2,3] are providing resources for making a smooth and friendly Haskell development experience relying on Nix. Similarly, if you are in academia, the experience using Guix for your computations should be friendlier. For example, working with R using Guix is just smooth. Or how easy is to apply package transformations in order to benchmark some HPC stuff. That’s because some research institutes [4] are providing resources for making a smooth and friendly experience. Do not take me wrong, Guix is not focused on academia issues and Nix on development ones. Both are free software and the limitation is people motivation, somehow. Personally, I mainly use Guix for doing computations in scientific context so most of my motivation is to improve this area. Improvements and the way to cover your needs is by discussing your troubles and then by trying to fix them, i.e., by sharing your hacks – even tiny ones. Maybe another fellow hacker will find that cool and they will be motivated for collaborating. Thanks to this collective sharing, we end up with tools that cover our needs, more or less. :-) 1: https://gitlab.haskell.org/bgamari/ghcs-nix 2: https://well-typed.com/ 3: https://www.tweag.io/ 4: https://hpc.guix.info/ > Another issue is that if I wanted to bring Guix into the development > workflow in a team, there would be the limitation of the OS. While I > promote free software in working groups, not everyone uses the same OS - > some use GNU/Linux, some use Mac, etc. I think this is also part of the > reason why Nix has succeeded in development environments. Somehow, I agree that having Guix running on other OSes than GNU/Linux will be helpful in attracting users. The archive provides such attempts, for instance: Guix on macOS from Chris Marusich Wed, 11 Oct 2017 20:29:57 -0700 https://yhetil.org/guix/87bmldavre@gmail.com First, please note that it’s far to be trivial to port Guix on any other OSes than GNU/Linux. Then, from my understanding, the blocking point is: you need to cheat using a very large binary seed or workarounds are somehow required and need to be applied against the core C library. Therefore, the intersection between all these deep technical difficulties and skilled people able to deal with them is currently empty. Mainly because Guix is rooted with GNU principles and motivation is not fungible. That’s said, I know people that are running Guix on MacOS using Rosetta and friends. Well, that’s not the right place to discuss that because we have to stay focus on free software. :-) > 1. > or something similar to the > overwrite feature in Nix flake? Could you explain what Nix flake is using Guix terms? Cheers, simon
Re: August Guix London Meetup
Hi, On Mon, 07 Aug 2023 at 00:02, Arun Isaac wrote: > The next Guix London meetup is scheduled for Thursday 24th August, 6 pm > onwards. As usual, it'll be a chance to talk about Guix, our favourite > distribution and package management system and the Guile programming > language. Sound really cool! Thanks for organizing that. Well, that’s motivating me for organizing something similar in Paris area. Any volunteer for helping? :-) Cheers, simon
Re: Updates for Go
at one point i tried to compile some large projects written in golang in a reproducible way, and making sure that they use the exact same versions of all their dependencies. in short: there's a philosophical mismatch between how guix and the golang crowd looks at building go apps. guix likes to explicitly represent every dependency in the guix namespace. golang has its own way of gathering the dependencies (and the nixos crowd don't mind "vendoring" the dependencies). i've also worked on the golang importer (https://issues.guix.gnu.org/55242 which needs a bit more care). once it works reliably enough, then it'd be possible to import the entire transitive closure of the dependencies into an isolated namespace in guix, which would be a halfway solution between the two conflicting philosophies. for now i've abandoned that endeavour in favor of adding binary packages to my channel, but i made some notes on the way: https://issues.guix.gnu.org/43872 a go-build-system patch http://issues.guix.gnu.org/50227 discussion with iskarian https://logs.guix.gnu.org/guix/2021-08-31.log#024401 https://logs.guix.gnu.org/guix/2021-08-31.log#180940 iskarian: If you search for my name and "go" or "golang" in the mailing list archives, you should find a lot of discussion https://savannah.gnu.org/users/lfam Here's a more recent message from me: https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/guix-devel/2019-03/msg00227.html Ah, I see I've unknowingly repeated you! https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/guix-patches/2021-08/msg01222.html Heh, it's gratifying that someone else came to the same conclusion. It means I wasn't totally in the weeds -- • attila lendvai • PGP: 963F 5D5F 45C7 DFCD 0A39 -- “The anxiety children feel at constantly being tested, their fear of failure, punishment, and disgrace, severely reduces their ability both to perceive and to remember, and drives them away from the material being studied into strategies for fooling teachers into thinking they know what they really don't know.” — John Holt (1923–1985), 'How Children Learn' (1967)
