allowUnfreePredicate woking on one machine but not the other

Help
1

Hello, so I have an issue very similar to this other issue but its solution does not match my circumstances

I have a laptop and a home computer that both share a file called global.nix. This file contains this:

    nixpkgs.config.allowUnfreePredicate = pkg: builtins.elem (lib.getName pkg) [
    #Doesnt install, just allows
            "obsidian"
            "spotify"
            "steam"
            "discord"
        ];

That will build just fine on my laptop but will give me errors like this on my pc:

       error: Package ā€˜steam-unwrapped-1.0.0.85ā€™ in /nix/store/g02rq8ap30x3fp8zrz07ip5v1s0pzidn-source/pkgs/by-name/st/steam-unwrapped/package.nix:47 has an unfree license (ā€˜unfreeRedistributableā€™), refusing to evaluate.

       a) To temporarily allow unfree packages, you can use an environment variable
          for a single invocation of the nix tools.

            $ export NIXPKGS_ALLOW_UNFREE=1
...

(I have tried to add steam-unwrapped-1.0.0.85 but that doesnā€™t work either)

I wouldnt like to rely on nixpkgs.config.allowUnfree = true; as I want to choose what non-free software goes into my computer

Both flakes are almost identical:

reduced flake.nix (pc)
{
    description = "Flake for Home-manager and shi";

    inputs = {
        nixpkgs.url = "nixpkgs/nixos-unstable";
        nixpkgs-stable.url = "nixpkgs/nixos-25.05";

        home-manager = {
            url = "github:nix-community/home-manager/master";
            #url = "github:nix-community/home-manager/release-25.05";
            inputs.nixpkgs.follows = "nixpkgs";
        };

    };

    outputs = {
        self,
        nixpkgs,
        home-manager,
        ...
    } @ inputs: let
        lib = nixpkgs.lib;
        system = "x86_64-linux";
        pkgs = nixpkgs.legacyPackages.${system};
    in {
        nixosConfigurations = {
            yamask = lib.nixosSystem {
                specialArgs = {inherit inputs system;};
                modules = [
                    ./configuration.nix
                ];
            };
        };

        homeConfigurations = {
            yamask = home-manager.lib.homeManagerConfiguration {
                inherit pkgs;
                modules = [
                    ./home.nix
                ];

                extraSpecialArgs = {
                    inputs = builtins.removeAttrs inputs ["self"];
                };
            };
        };
    };
}

and

flake.nix (laptop)
{
    description = "Flake for Home-manager and shi";

    inputs = {
        nixpkgs.url = "nixpkgs/nixos-unstable";
        nixpkgs-stable.url = "nixpkgs/nixos-25.05";

        home-manager = {
            #url = "github:nix-community/home-manager/release-25.05";
            url = "github:nix-community/home-manager/master";
            inputs.nixpkgs.follows = "nixpkgs"; # Check if the versions are the same
        };
    };

    outputs = {
        self,
        nixpkgs,
        home-manager
        ...
    } @ inputs:
    let
        lib = nixpkgs.lib;
        system = "x86_64-linux";
        pkgs = nixpkgs.legacyPackages.${system};
    in {
        nixosConfigurations = {
            dwebble = lib.nixosSystem {
                specialArgs = {inherit inputs system;};
                modules = [
                    ./configuration.nix
                ];
            };
        };

        homeConfigurations = {
            dwebble = home-manager.lib.homeManagerConfiguration {
                inherit pkgs;
                modules = [
                    ./home.nix
                ];

                extraSpecialArgs = {
                    inputs = builtins.removeAttrs inputs ["self"];
                };
            };
        };
    };
}

Each system then has its own files but as far as I can tell they shoulnā€™t have any effect on this

Thanks!

2

Forgot to mention that I am currently using

(discord.overrideAttrs (old: {
    meta = old.meta // {
      license = lib.licenses.free; # Lie to Nix to bypass the check
    };
  }))

as a workaround but I donā€™t know how to do this for programs like steam:

programs.steam.enable = true;
3

Thereā€™s a programs.steam.package option, I believe.

As for why itā€™s not workingā€¦ have you set nixpkgs.pkgs or _module.args.pkgs?

nvm, the issue is just that steam-unwrapped is a separate package and you havenā€™t included that, I think. It would normally error out on the direct package first, and never get to its dependency. The fact that itā€™s reporting it for the unwrapped package (the dependency) suggests the predicate is actually working. Iā€™m assuming you didnā€™t install steam on the laptop?

5

Youā€™d need to add steam-unwrapped to that list as mentioned.

If you look at option b) in the error message, it will tell you the actual string to add.

6

Ok thanks that seem to have fixed it but its very wierd because literally yesterday I had the same error for discord and spotify

I also had an allowUnfreePredicate list specific to my pc so I had 2 in total. Could it be that what caused the isse? I canā€™t think of anythin else Iā€™ve changed

7

Did you install discord/spotify through home-manager or nixos?

8

We canā€™t answer definitely about code that you wrote in the past or what you may or may not have changed, unless you have a working example where itā€™s erroring again. Glad itā€™s working!

Make sure you have the code tracked in git or at least backed up frequently (but git will be better longterm).

1 Like
9

Through nixos. It was the same thing just one list was for ā€œglobalā€ (meaning both pc and laptop) packages and the other one was steam and discord only (just on my pc)

Anyway thank for the help. I dont want to keep wasting your time