### Author:  [@fzakaria](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/fzakaria)
#### Post date: [August 10, 2025, 10:08pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/1 "2025-08-10T22:08:20Z")
> **[Angle brackets in a Nix flake world](https://fzakaria.com/2025/08/10/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world)**
>
> At DEFCON33, the Nix community had its first-ever presence via nix.vegas and I ended up in fun conversation with tomberek š.
---
### Author:  [@MagicRB](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/MagicRB)
#### Post date: [August 11, 2025, 6:24am UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/2 "2025-08-11T06:24:05Z")
Nice write up, the use of the angle bracket syntax is interesting. Though i think i disagree that adding `buitins.currentFlake` would be pure. Itās also very very hard to define, when it should switch a flake input of the toplevel flake. So Iām not sure such a chabge would be a net positive
---
### Author:  [@eljamm](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/eljamm)
#### Post date: [August 11, 2025, 12:30pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/3 "2025-08-11T12:30:27Z")
This is quite interesting indeed, but why donāt you use `self` instead of `getFlake`?
> **flake.nix**
>
> ```nix
> {
> inputs = {
> nixpkgs.url = "github:NixOS/nixpkgs/nixos-unstable";
> nixpkgslib.url = "github:nix-community/nixpkgs.lib";
> };
> description = "Trivial flake that returns a string for eval";
>
> outputs =
> {
> nixpkgslib,
> nixpkgs,
> self,
> }:
> {
> __findFile =
> nixPath: name:
> let
> lib = nixpkgslib.lib;
> in
> lib.getAttrFromPath (lib.splitString "." name) self;
>
> hello = "Hello from a flake!";
> example = builtins.scopedImport self ./default.nix;
> };
> }
>
> ```
> **default.nix**
>
> ```nix
> + " and welcome to Nix!"
>
> ```
```shellSession
$ nix eval .#example
"Hello from a flake! and welcome to Nix!"
```
---
### Author:  [@fzakaria](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/fzakaria)
#### Post date: [August 11, 2025, 12:48pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/4 "2025-08-11T12:48:46Z")
Thank you thatās great.
Originally I had the lookup in a different file before I discovered scopedImport
Iāll update the example with this š¤š
---
### Author:  [@llakala](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/llakala)
#### Post date: [August 11, 2025, 1:12pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/5 "2025-08-11T13:12:59Z")
While I appreciate the concept of new angle bracket syntax, I donāt think the Nix language needs flake-specific syntax. Flakes have been adopted by the majority of the community - but NIX\_PATH was previously adopted by the majority of the community. The shortcomings of flakes are [well-documented](https://jade.fyi/blog/flakes-arent-real/), and they are still experimental for established reasons. Even the biggest proponents of Flake stabilization acknowledge that [future iterations on Flakes will happen](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/determinate-nix-3-0/61202/129), and plan on supporting them.
I donāt think entrenching ourselves further in flakeland is the right move. Iād prefer to see angle brackets used for something more meaningful, like [providing a module system with faster evaluation](https://gist.github.com/edolstra/29ce9d8ea399b703a7023073b0dbc00d).
---
### Author:  [@aanderse](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/aanderse)
#### Post date: [August 11, 2025, 1:13pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/6 "2025-08-11T13:13:41Z")
as always another cool article from @fzakaria š¶
personally i prefer a simplified `__findFile` like this:
```auto
__findFile = nixPath: name: inputs.${name};
```
that isā¦ map each flake input, but not output
my reasoning is that this is a more natural progression from channels to flakes and keeps the same semantics - flake inputs are an extension/improvement/natural progression of channels
but then againā¦ i donāt like most flake outputs, so i guess i have a bias thereā¦ š
---
### Author:  [@fzakaria](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/fzakaria)
#### Post date: [August 11, 2025, 4:07pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/7 "2025-08-11T16:07:20Z")
Thanks for the kind words.
The problem with ${name} is that if you do āa.bā it puts it as a single attribute quoted. I guess for inputs it may not matter.
Why support output?
Well I want to access my own packages or modules sometimes instead of through an overlay
---
### Author:  [@fzakaria](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/fzakaria)
#### Post date: [August 11, 2025, 4:10pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/8 "2025-08-11T16:10:13Z")
I just pushed an update to the blog with your improvement ā thank you.
---
### Author:  [@leana8959](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/leana8959)
#### Post date: [August 19, 2025, 1:51pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/9 "2025-08-19T13:51:55Z")
The ability to use angle brackets is very interesting, though `scopedImport` has huge performance penalty (iirc it disables memoisation). Some testing with `nix-instantiate` (I donāt use flake but npins) shows that the evaluation time goes from 17 seconds to almost 30 seconds, doubling the evaluation timeā¦
---
### Author:  [@tripleo](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/tripleo)
#### Post date: [October 4, 2025, 5:07pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/10 "2025-10-04T17:07:39Z")
might be slighlty off topic:
>
---
### Author:  [@SergeK](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/SergeK)
#### Post date: [October 4, 2025, 8:24pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/11 "2025-10-04T20:24:35Z")
> _eventual deprecation of `NIX_PATH`?_
ā š«
---
### Author:  [@aanderse](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/aanderse)
#### Post date: [October 4, 2025, 8:48pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/12 "2025-10-04T20:48:53Z")
that document was presented _forever_ ago at a nixcon for ideas on where to headā¦ it is vaporware now, not going to happen
* * *
as far as deprecating `NIX_PATH` thoughā¦ i bet some people actually want to do that - i hope that wonāt happen
recently i started playing around with [lon](https://github.com/nikstur/lon) (ā¤ @nikstur) and started utilizing angle brackets again after having switched to flakes many years ago now
one of my `shell.nix` files looks like as an experiment:
```auto
let
sources = import ./lon.nix;
pkgs = import sources.nixpkgs { };
in
pkgs.mkShell {
shellHook = ''
export NIX_PATH=${pkgs.lib.concatMapAttrsStringSep ":" (k: v: "${k}=${v}") sources}
'';
}
```
i hooked that up to `direnv` and now whenever i enter that project directory i can access `` in a well defined way - whether in `repl` or something like `nixos-rebuild`, everything has access to `NIX_PATH`
i havenāt been using this long enough to decide how much i like it yetā¦ but it has been a blast from the past at least
---
### Author:  [@bme](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/bme)
#### Post date: [October 5, 2025, 4:46pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/14 "2025-10-05T16:46:29Z")
I really think NIX\_PATH is great. It supremely useful when mucking about with the repl to just say āgimme the nixpkgs in contextā whether thatās system wide, or in some project, itās useful shorthand. I use it _all the time_ for answering āwhat about??ā repl questions in the global system context. If I want to turn into something stable/shareable, well I can just copy the system nixpkgs pin and move from ephemeral to permanent.
NIX\_PATH \<3 for ever!
---
### Author:  [@Lord-Valen](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/Lord-Valen)
#### Post date: [October 10, 2025, 1:34am UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/15 "2025-10-10T01:34:10Z")
I think `builtins.scopedImport self` is rather reckless. You could accidentally override a number of things. It would be safer to do something like this:
```nix
{
outputs =
{ self, nixpkgs, ... }:
let
inherit (nixpkgs) lib;
scope = {
__findFile = _: name: lib.getAttrFromPath (lib.splitString "." name) self;
};
in
{
scoped = builtins.scopedImport scope ./default.nix;
};
inputs = {
nixpkgs.url = "https://channels.nixos.org/nixpkgs-unstable/nixexprs.tar.xz";
};
}
```
If you were to define something like `import` in the outputs of the previous example (not intending to override the `import` global), you might just break all subsequent calls to `import`. Obviously, I donāt think anyone would actually do _that_ (at least, I hope not), but Iām sure you can see how similar things _could_ happen:
```nix
# scoped.nix or selfed.nix
{
pkgs = import { };
}
# flake.nix
{
outputs =
{ self, nixpkgs, ... }:
let
inherit (nixpkgs) lib;
scope = {
__findFile = _: name: lib.getAttrFromPath (lib.splitString "." name) self;
};
in
{
inherit (scope) __findFile;
# Oh no! Unanticipated name conflict!
# If we use `self` as the scope, this overrides the `import` global.
import = import nixpkgs { };
# In `selfed.nix`, `import` is a set.
# That causes an error.
selfed = builtins.scopedImport self ./selfed.nix;
# In `scoped.nix`, `import` is the builtin function.
# Everything goes as expected.
scoped = builtins.scopedImport scope ./scoped.nix;
};
inputs = {
nixpkgs.url = "https://channels.nixos.org/nixpkgs-unstable/nixexprs.tar.xz";
};
}
```
Itās littering, at best, because everything in `outputs` becomes global.
---
### Author:  [@vic](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/vic)
#### Post date: [November 5, 2025, 6:48am UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/16 "2025-11-05T06:48:40Z")
Hey, @fzakaria
Thanks for your blog post! It served as inspiration for an **experimental feature** in `den`, where we have nested trees of aspects, `den.aspects.foo.provides.bar.provides.baz`, we already had an alias `_` for `provide`, so `den.aspects.foo._.bar._.baz` is not that bad, however using your idea:
`` becomes `den.aspects.foo.provides.bar.provides.baz` !
See the linked PR bellow:
> **[Have you seen those \`.\_.\` little faces ? Ā· vic/den Ā· Discussion #34](https://github.com/vic/den/discussions/34#discussioncomment-14877216)**
>
> Have you seen those \`.\_.\` little faces ?
---
### Author:  [@Lillecarl](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/Lillecarl)
#### Post date: [November 6, 2025, 2:06pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/angle-brackets-in-a-nix-flake-world/67855/17 "2025-11-06T14:06:01Z")
You can always copy to store without flakes, talking about deprecating NIX\_PATH is blasphemy and trying to bait mindset DJT style.
I donāt know what Stockholm syndrome flake users are experiencing but I really donāt get it. They just add more rules and limits and force you to reimplement every attrset N times for chasing some purity nirvana thatās entirely useless in practice, where are the gains!?