[Nix-dev] Getting started with cloned nixpkgs: multiple errors and other questions

[Jesse Haber-Kucharsky]

Hi everyone.

I've successfully installed NixOS and subscribed to the unstable channel
and everything there seems to be working well.

I started having problems when I wanted to start contributing packages and
upgrades to nixpkgs.

I cloned the master branch of github.com/nixos/nixpkgs and set my NIX_PATH
to point exclusively to the local checkout with "export
NIX_PATH=/home/jhaberku/src" (nixpkgs exist in the "nixpkgs" directory in
that location).

Now, aside from nix complaining about unfree packages and packages marked
as bad (which I set in my ~/.nixpkgs/config.nix file as directed), I get
this error all the time:

 $ NIX_PATH=/home/jhaberku/src nix-env -qa firefox
error: attribute ‘interpreterName’ missing, at
"/home/jhaberku/src/nixpkgs/pkgs/development/web/nodejs/build-node-package.nix":7:16

I checkout out a version of nixpkgs from many days earlier, and had no such
problem. This leads to me questions:

- Was I doing things the right way? If so, is this just a bug that slipped
through the radar, or is the master branch regularly broken like this? If
this is normal for master, how does anyone get anything done if nix-env
refuses to do anything when a package is broken? If it's not a bug (and an
error in my configuration), what can I do to fix it?

- I'm running my NixOS installation from the nixos-unstable channel and I
have some system-level packages specified in /etc/nixos/configuration.nix.
If I somehow manage to get the master branch of nixpkgs actually working,
is there any reason why I shouldn't install all my user-level packages from
my local clone of master with "nix-env -i"? In other words, is it okay that
the system-wide packages are from a different channel than the user-level
packages?

Thanks
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