How to simulate an Ubuntu environment via shell.nix?

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1

I’m trying to use following shell.nix to simulate a develop environment to run some ELF provided by others.

{ pkgs ? import <nixpkgs> {} }:

(pkgs.buildFHSUserEnv {
  name = "devbox";
  targetPkgs = pkgs: (with pkgs; [
    python39
    python39Packages.pip
    python39Packages.virtualenv
    openssl
    zlib
    stdenv.cc.cc.lib
  ]);
  runScript = "zsh";
}).env

But it core dumped.

And it is known that everything works well on Ubuntu 20.04, so is it possible for me to simulate an Ubuntu-like env use a shell.nix ?

2

Maybe it’s different with buildFHSUserEnv, but normally you would do (python39.withPackages (ps: with ps; [ pip virtualenv ])). If the program doesn’t output useful crash information, I have had luck running it with strace to see what else might be missing.

3

Oh nevermind, I guess that works fine if you are just using them on the command line separately, not as modules.

4

I don’t know… but I wouldn’t try to enter a FHS UE by nix-shell. It’s a thing that you build and then enter by running the result. (Though my experience with FHS is basically just for games.)

5

I find it finally working like this:

#!/usr/bin/env nix-shell

{ pkgs ? import <nixpkgs> {} }:

(pkgs.buildFHSUserEnv {
  name = "devbox";
  targetPkgs = pkgs: (with pkgs; [
    python38
    python38Packages.pip
    python38Packages.virtualenv
    openssl
    zlib
    stdenv.cc.cc.lib
    pythonManylinuxPackages.manylinux2014Package
  ]);
  runScript = "zsh";
}).env

The key is add pythonManylinuxPackages.manylinux2014Package and make sure the python version correct :slight_smile:

3 Likes
6

I put my latest version here : Nix Script to simulate FHS environment with python3 & pip & venv · GitHub

Purpose of above script is to simulate an environment for python (pip) users. But it still have many limitations.

Hoping for a better solution to simulate an Ubuntu environment so that we can run more softwares.

1 Like