# Why are flakes still experimental?

**URL:** https://discourse.nixos.org/t/why-are-flakes-still-experimental/29317
**Category:** Help
**Created:** [June 19, 2023, 10:03am UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/why-are-flakes-still-experimental/29317 "2023-06-19T10:03:29Z")
**Posts on this page:** 1
**Showing post:** 11

<div class="post-metadata">

### Author: ![ElvishJerricco](https://discourse.nixos.org/user_avatar/discourse.nixos.org/elvishjerricco/32/984_2.png) [@ElvishJerricco](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/ElvishJerricco)
#### Post date: [June 19, 2023, 5:28pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/why-are-flakes-still-experimental/29317/11 "2023-06-19T17:28:45Z")

</div>

(I left a comment before reading some of the thread here, and it turns out my point was largely redundant)

I am also fairly annoyed with the way `system` is handled with flakes. But I’m also annoyed at how people have basically thrown overlays out the window because of the non-composable static outputs attrset. If I have to override a common dependency to add a patch or something, it’s now a rat’s nest of manual `.override` calls and praying that I didn’t miss anything. That, or I have to fork something and then I’m left with the same problem except with a rat’s nest of `follows`.

I know the output schema includes an attr for overlays, but it seems like no one ever uses it, and it’s also not clear whether a flake is expected to include its own inputs’ overlays in its output overlays, or if the consumer of the flake is expected to compose them. It’s a mess.

Personally, I think flakes really need solutions to these problems. But it doesn’t seem like that’s ever going to happen, so I guess they should just be released as-is 😕

---

_[View the full topic](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/why-are-flakes-still-experimental/29317)._