[mikepurvis]

I agree that there's a huge documentation and user awareness gap, but NixOS is obviously possible to configure this way so it's definitely possible.

Might be room for a tool that exposes just the configuration management side of Nix in a more approachable way... on the other hand it would be a bit silly to use nix for conf files and not also for the underlying packages.

[sanderjd]

I guess it strikes me as not just a documentation and awareness gap, but a different paradigm in a more fundamental way.

I think your last sentence gets at that too: For Nix, configuration management is just one component of a broader and more powerful paradigm. And it seems to me like putting a square peg in a round hole (or as you say, a bit silly) to try to use it to solve this narrower and simpler problem.

[__MatrixMan__]

Better to learn a tiny corner of nix (which you may later apply to the rest of it, or not) than to learn a language with a narrower use case.

But one who embraces nix fully is one who is willing to commit a lot of time to turning their back on convention. Returning to 90% of the conventions that they worked so hard to leave behind probably won't excite them.

So it's not silly, it's just that the person to do it is culturally unlikely.

[sanderjd]

> Better to learn a tiny corner of nix (which you may later apply to the rest of it, or not) than to learn a language with a narrower use case.

"Better" in what way?

Like, maybe I agree in some sort of philosophical sense, of how it's better to learn and expand one's awareness of what exists and is possible in the world. That is, better for students, similarly to how I'd say it is better for students to learn lisp and haskell, because they'll figure out how to use javascript and python and C# or whatever as needed on the job. And I'm a believer in life-long learning, that everyone should do their damndest to carve out time to be a student at all times throughout life. So certainly I'm in favor of learning about Nix and its config structure and comparing and contrasting it to other things like this Pkl.

But I don't think the idea of using Nix's config management instead of a narrowly-targeted config management tool would be "better" in the sense of a professional figuring out how to set up or refactor the config structure within the non-Nix paradigm of the vast majority of organizations. And that's what I've been talking about here.

I'm actually a Nix kool-aid drinker, believe it or not, and I hope its paradigm will sweep the world, but I also have to do what's right by the organizations I work within at each moment in time, and being at the vanguard of the Nix paradigm has not been that, in my view, yet.

[__MatrixMan__]

If you're:

> a professional figuring out how to set up or refactor the config structure within the non-Nix paradigm of the vast majority of organizations

Then I don't think nix-as-config-only is a good move. But if you're a professional figuring out how to set up or refactor the config structure of some organization, AND for some reason you've already decided that you're going to introduce a language that nobody in the organization uses, then would I say that nix is a good choice. This is because there are probably other people in that organization that would find nix useful if they were already over the syntax adjustment phase.

If a multitool's screwdriver is just as good as a normal screwdriver (granted they're usually not), why not prefer the multitool?

Generally I'd just suggest using whatever languages are already around, config-focused or otherwise. For instance we have a lot of python in our stack so I've found a library called mergedict that gets us close enough to the composability of nix modules without adding a new language.

[sanderjd]

> Then I don't think nix-as-config-only is a good move.

Yep, that was the only narrow point I was trying to make initially :)

> If a multitool's screwdriver is just as good as a normal screwdriver (granted they're usually not), why not prefer the multitool?

Under the assumption that the multitool's screwdriver is just as good, then yeah, that might make sense. But as you grant, that is usually not the case. And my original point is that this is one of those usual cases where it is not as good, not one of those rare cases where it is just as good. And the reason Nix is not just as good for this, is that it was not made for this, it was made for something different and bigger.

> For instance we have a lot of python in our stack so I've found a library called mergedict that gets us close enough to the composability of nix modules without adding a new language.

Things like mergedict, while being a common genre of solution to this problem, are not a good solution to it. They are the total mess I said I'm always keeping an eye out for better alternatives to.

I don't know yet if I think Pkl (or Cue or any of the rest) actually fit that bill, but your contention that there is no point looking for solutions to this problem short of Nix strikes me as a classic case of making perfect the enemy of good.