NixOS Search - Polls

Development
1

About Nix Search Tools

How often do you use NixOS Search?
  • I was not aware it existed
  • I was aware of its existence, but I never really used it
  • Multiple times per week
  • Multiple times per month
  • Once a month
  • Less than once a month
0 voters
How often do you use NixOS Search: Flakes (the 3rd party flake page) specifically?
  • I was not aware it existed
  • I was aware of its existence, but I never really used it
  • Multiple times per week
  • Multiple times per month
  • Once a month
  • Less than once a month
0 voters

On the above poll, if you selected “I was not aware it existed” or “I was aware of its existence, but I never really used it”, please comment what would it take for you to use it more often

How often do you use nh search?
  • I was not aware it existed
  • I was aware of its existence, but I never really used it
  • Multiple times per week
  • Multiple times per month
  • Once a month
  • Less than once a month
0 voters

If you use other Nix search tools, please comment which and your usage frequency of it

Related

1 Like
2

I routinely use NixOS search multiple times a day

10 Likes
3

For the next poll I will remember to add a choice for the unemployed /s

8 Likes
4

I use these aliases quite often:

(yes I know nixos-wiki is wrong, I don’t use it.)
I also use https://home-manager-options.extranix.com quite often, I rather like the search UI.
nixos-config/nix/firefox/default.nix at 798558c788dea7874ce07b8c55a362aedd6b95da · bitbloxhub/nixos-config · GitHub
I sometimes use Noogle, but I often find it lacking (not their fault, and it’s quite useful even when they just have a link to the source, so I don’t have to dig around nixpkgs to find it).
nixos-config/nix/firefox/default.nix at 798558c788dea7874ce07b8c55a362aedd6b95da · bitbloxhub/nixos-config · GitHub

4 Likes
5

I also have multiple search engines setup in Chrome

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1 Like
6

lol for what it’s worth I do this at my day job where I’m in charge of nix :slight_smile:

6 Likes
7

In my case, I have learnt to use nix-search-tv (through fzf/television) almost exclusively. Supports basically everything (packages, options, nur, …) by default except searching in 3rd-party flakes, which, in my case, I never need anyway. I look for flakes on my own time and follow their READMEs to get the information needed.

Quick access to the official manuals and wiki.nixos.org is a must-have, too.

2 Likes
8

I use Nix Software every day. I might be a little biased :grinning_face_with_smiling_eyes:

2 Likes
9

It is kinda funny when work and hobby align, ain’t it?

I should probably get a better workflow for browsing nix search, but the links are very convenient for spot checking module/package quality, rather than opening up my outdated local clone.

1 Like
10

I use nix-search-cli multiple times per week

11

I did not know this one, will test

12

This might just be because its the first thing I ever found for searching nixpkgs, but I tend to use mynixos.com

although since that website only ever covers the current stable release, and tends to lag a bit behind releases, I find myself occasionally using search.nixos.org to just like double check myself. But I will mainly use MyNixOS, I just much prefer the UI and the little system where you can click on an option for a module and click back through to the module’s full options (I’m really bad at remembering things so I’ll search up hyper specific option values to end up at the full module lol)

13

I mostly use NixOS search to look up module options. I don’t really have a reason to search for flakes, so I’ve never used it to do that.

1 Like
14

I use search.nixos.org very often to look up packages and check their current versions in both stable and unstable channels.

I also use it to search modules and explore options, mainly for discoverability. For deeper dives, I prefer going to the source, which I sometimes navigate to from the search page.

I have tried the third-party flakes search, but I have not found it very useful. It works well when I already know which package I am looking for, but there are not enough listed flakes to support broader discovery. I would like something similar to the NUR page, where I can explore available flakes and discover packages and projects I could potentially use.

15

I am aware of, but have never used the 3rd-party Flakes search. It just doesn’t contain the majority of Flakes I use.

3 Likes
16

I’ve mostly been using nh search, although after one of the recent releases, it has become much slower.

17

For how often I use search.nixos.org I answered “I was aware of its existence, but I never really used it”, and the poll asks for comments on what it would take for you to use it more often.

To be honest, the answer would be removing CLI tools, which obviously isn’t what I actually want.

For my own personal workflow, when editing my config or spinning up a shell, I’d rather not have to open up a browser to look something up. I use man configuration.nix, nix-search, nixos-option, command-not-found for all of this functionality. Really the only reason I use search.nixos.org is to have something that I can link more directly when helping someone else.

18

just a gentle reminder… :laughing: but seriously, the nixos.org flake search probably fell off my stack bc (as echo’d by others) a number of popular flakes just aren’t listed in that TOML manifest that results in them being added to the index on search.nixos.org. perhaps if it gains some inertia.

i’ve also used the extranix search to discover home-manager options in the past.

20

I use the man pages all the time (multiple times per week), and like withakay said only use the website when sending links to help people. I like the “flat” view of everything in a pager that I can regex through. I’ve also got my own script to view “subsets” of the man-pages when I want a more focused view, e.g. home-manager.wayland.windowManager.sway or nixvim.lsp.servers or nixos.systemd.services

1 Like
21

Feel free to make a PR, you can CC me for initial review too

2 Likes