Systemd-timer: nvidia-smi command not found

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1

I’m trying to make services to switch the power limit of my Nvidia deivce, by using sudo nvidia-smi -pl <POWER_NUMBER>. Here’s my flake file.

/etc/nixos/modules/nvidia.nix 
{ config, lib, pkgs, ... }:
{
    config = {

        # environment.systemPackages = with pkgs; [
        #     (config.boot.kernelPackages.nvidiaPackages.beta)
        # ];

        systemd.timers."nvidia-power-limit-high" = {
            wantedBy = [ "timers.target" ];
            timerConfig = {
                Unit = "nvidia-power-limit-high.service";
                OnCalendar = "*-*-* 1:50:00";
            };
        };
        systemd.services."nvidia-power-limit-high" = {
            script = ''
                nvidia-smi -pl 280
            '';
            serviceConfig = {
                Type = "oneshot";
                User = "root";
            };
        };
        

        systemd.timers."nvidia-power-limit-low" = {
            wantedBy = [ "timers.target" ];
            timerConfig = {
                Unit = "nvidia-power-limit-low.service";
                OnCalendar = "*-*-* 6:00:00";
                Persistent = true;
            };
        };
        systemd.services."nvidia-power-limit-low" = {
            script = ''
                nvidia-smi -pl 120
            '';
            serviceConfig = {
                Type = "oneshot";
                User = "root";
            };
        };

    };
}

But it says nvidia-smi command not found. (Ignore that mismatch of time, it’s just for tests.)

 systemctl status nvidia-power-limit-high.service                                                                                                                                                                                                       (ai) 
○ nvidia-power-limit-high.service
     Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/nvidia-power-limit-high.service; linked; preset: ignored)
     Active: inactive (dead) since Sat 2025-02-22 18:48:00 CST; 55min ago
 Invocation: 442663f238b341e1b921a80c8f088816
TriggeredBy: ● nvidia-power-limit-high.timer
   Main PID: 1003678 (code=exited, status=127)
         IO: 0B read, 0B written
   Mem peak: 1.8M
        CPU: 5ms

Feb 22 18:48:00 nixos systemd[1]: Starting nvidia-power-limit-high.service...
Feb 22 18:48:00 nixos nvidia-power-limit-high-start[1003679]: /nix/store/pynlrbqmlm93ld223n48h91kj3k7dj78-unit-script-nvidia-power-limit-high-start/bin/nvidia-power-limit-high-start: line 4: nvidia-smi: command not found
Feb 22 18:48:00 nixos systemd[1]: nvidia-power-limit-high.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=127/n/a
Feb 22 18:48:00 nixos systemd[1]: nvidia-power-limit-high.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.
Feb 22 18:48:00 nixos systemd[1]: Failed to start nvidia-power-limit-high.service.

I did read the wiki, it says an executable binary file should be referenced by a ${pkgs.???} path, such as ${pkgs.git}/bin/git. But I can’t find which package that starts with “pkgs.” contains nvidia-smi. Do I miss something important? Thanks for your help.

2

Normally I’d suggest NixOS Search as it searches also by binary name, but apparently searching on nvidia-smi doesn’t return anything reasonable.

If it works for you from command line, then running readlink $(which nvidia-smi) might give you a clue on package name. Note however that package name and the attribute it’s visible at (what you’d put in ${pkgs.xxx}/bin/nivdia-smi) can be different beasts.

3

config.boot.kernelPackages.nvidia_x11 iirc.