Nix Flakes - How to install a specific older version of an app

1

Hi
Converting from nix channels to nix flakes. All is well so far. Next issues is
how to install an older version of audacity, predating telemetry issues.
In ix channels I could select audacity 2.3.2 from Nix Package Versions and run: nix-env -iA audacity -f https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/archive/b5b7bd6ebba2a165e33726b570d7ab35177cf951.tar.gz

  1. How do I do this with nix profile?
  2. Can I pin the package so it will not change when I do an update? Maybe with a
    lockfile?
  3. Can I create an appimage of it?

I tried
nix profile install nixpkgs/b5b7bd6ebba2a165e33726b570d7ab35177cf951#audacity
but got error: getting status of ‘/nix/store/7mgzqmz0h4bnls36jimk4krqlrkbl3w8-source/flake.nix’: No such file or directory

Thanks

Murray

2

That particular commit has been made long before the flake.nix was added.

It got added in 8eaf02b9cd35def36217d39812b7c656de307c58 (Feb 2020).

Though that is incompatible with how flakes work today.

The first I can find that would work with the modern CLI was 97fc8af29b59acc55e7544a2e86b8941f9257b1e (June 2020), which provides Audacity 2.4.1:

$ nix eval nixpkgs/97fc8af29b59acc55e7544a2e86b8941f9257b1e#audacity.version
"2.4.1"

What might work is to create your own flake, that loads that old nixpkgs commit you need as a flake input with flake = false, imports it and exposes the audacity version.

Instead though I would suggest to use one of the many forks that came up, as I understand it, because of the telemetry issues you mention.

3

I’ll assume you know how to build it (flake-less). Then you can at least do nix profile install /nix/store/somepath… but yes, not nice.

4

PS: nix profile inherits a lot of the problems nix-env and apt have as well due to their imperative nature. You might prefer declarative approaches.

1 Like
5

Thanks for the reply,
Can’t create a flake yet, to do list.

Maybe third part website will convert to nix profile sometime.

Murr

6

Thanks for the reply. Appreciated

Murr