I wrote a quick automated install script at [[./install.sh][install.sh]]. It essentially just runs [[Manual Install Procedure][the manual install steps]] and additionally hardens the security of the system-level (root configuration) files using [[./harden.sh][harden.sh]].
The quickest way to install is running the install script directly from the remote git repo using =nix run=, which is essentially just one of the following:
If the above =nix run= command gives you an error, odds are you either don't have =git= installed, or you haven't enabled the experimental features in your Nix config (=nix-command= and =flakes=). To get the command to install properly, you can first enter a shell with =git= and =nixFlakes= available using:
At a certain point in the install script it will open =nano= (or whatever your $EDITOR is set to) and ask you to edit the =flake.nix=. You can edit as much or as little of the config variables as you like, and it will continue the install after you exit the editor.
Potential Errors: I've only tested it working on UEFI with the default EFI mount point of =/boot=. I've added experimental legacy (BIOS) boot support, but it does rely on a quick and dirty script to find the grub device. If you are testing it using some weird boot configuration for whatever reason, try modifying =bootMountPath= (UEFI) or =grubDevice= (legacy BIOS) in =flake.nix= before install, or else it will complain about not being able to install the bootloader.
Note: If you're installing this to a VM, Hyprland won't work unless 3D acceleration is enabled.
Disclaimer: If you install my =homelab= or =worklab= profiles /CHANGE THE PUBLIC SSH KEYS UNLESS YOU WANT ME TO BE ABLE TO SSH INTO YOUR SERVER. YOU CAN CHANGE OR REMOVE THE SSH KEY IN THE RELEVANT CONFIGURATION.NIX/:
- [[./profiles/homelab/configuration.nix][configuration.nix]] for homelab profile
- [[./profiles/worklab/configuration.nix][configuration.nix]] for worklab profile
At a certain point in the install script it will open =nano= (or whatever your =$EDITOR= is set to) and ask you to edit the =flake.nix=. You can edit as much or as little of the config variables as you like, and it will continue the install after you exit the editor.
Potential Errors: I've only tested it working on UEFI with the default EFI mount point of =/boot=. I've added experimental legacy (BIOS) boot support, but it does rely on a quick and dirty script to find the grub device. If you are testing it using some weird boot configuration for whatever reason, try modifying =bootMountPath= (UEFI) or =grubDevice= (legacy BIOS) in =flake.nix= before install, or else it will complain about not being able to install the bootloader.
Note: If you're installing this to a VM, Hyprland won't work unless 3D acceleration is enabled.
Disclaimer: If you install my =homelab= or =worklab= profiles /CHANGE THE PUBLIC SSH KEYS UNLESS YOU WANT ME TO BE ABLE TO SSH INTO YOUR SERVER. YOU CAN CHANGE OR REMOVE THE SSH KEY IN THE RELEVANT CONFIGURATION.NIX/:
- [[./profiles/homelab/configuration.nix][configuration.nix]] for homelab profile
- [[./profiles/worklab/configuration.nix][configuration.nix]] for worklab profile
At this time, this only works on an existing NixOS install. It also only works if the dotfiles are cloned into =~/.dotfiles=. It also only works on UEFI, not on BIOS :(
If you instead want to install this manually to see all the steps (kind of like an Arch install before the archinstall script existed), you can follow this following procedure:
Also, if you have a differently named user account than my default (=emmet=), you /must/ update the following lines in the let binding near the top of the [[./flake.nix][flake.nix]]:
Potential Errors: I've only tested it working on UEFI with the default EFI mount point of =/boot=. I've added experimental legacy (BIOS) boot support, but it does rely on a quick and dirty script to find the grub device. If you are testing it using some weird boot configuration for whatever reason, try modifying =bootMountPath= (UEFI) or =grubDevice= (legacy BIOS) in =flake.nix= before install, or else it will complain about not being able to install the bootloader.
Note: If you're installing this to a VM, Hyprland won't work unless 3D acceleration is enabled.
Disclaimer: If you install my =homelab= or =worklab= profiles /CHANGE THE PUBLIC SSH KEYS UNLESS YOU WANT ME TO BE ABLE TO SSH INTO YOUR SERVER. YOU CAN CHANGE OR REMOVE THE SSH KEY IN THE RELEVANT CONFIGURATION.NIX/:
- [[./profiles/homelab/configuration.nix][configuration.nix]] for homelab profile
- [[./profiles/worklab/configuration.nix][configuration.nix]] for worklab profile
If it fails with something to the effect of "could not download {some image file}" then that just means that one of my themes is having trouble downloading the background image. To conserve on space in the repo, my themes download the relevant wallpapers directly from their source, but that also means that if the link is broken, =home-manager switch= fails.
I have included a script in the [[./themes][themes directory]] named [[./themes/background-test.sh][background-test.sh]] which performs a rough test on every theme background url, reporting which are broken.
If you're having this error, navigate to the [[./flake.nix][flake.nix]] and select any theme with a good background wallpaper link. As long as it is able to download the new wallpaper, it should be able to build.
No. You can put them in literally any directory you want. I just prefer to use =~/.dotfiles= as a convention. If you change the directory, do keep in mind that the above scripts must be modified, replacing =~/.dotfiles= with whatever directory you want to install them to. Also, you may want to modify the =dotfilesDir= variable in =flake.nix=.
*** It fails installing with some weird errors about grub or a bootloader?
It will 100% fail if you test it with a non-default boot configuration. It might even give this error otherwise! If this is the case, try modifying =bootMountPath= (UEFI) or =grubDevice= (legacy BIOS) in =flake.nix= before installing again.
*** The install seems to work, but when I login, I'm missing a lot of stuff (partial install)
This can happen if you run the autoinstall script on a system that already has a desktop environment, or if any other (non-Nix-store-symlink) config files are in the way of the config files generated by home-manager. In these cases, home-manager refuses to build anything, even if there's just one file in the way. If you try running =nix run home-manager/master -- switch --flake ~/.dotfiles#user=, it should throw an error at the end with something like:
#+begin_example
Existing file '/home/user/.gtkrc-2.0' is in the way of '/nix/store/6p3hzdbzhad8ra5j1qf4b2b3hs6as6sf-home-manager-files/.gtkrc-2.0'
Existing file '/home/user/.config/Trolltech.conf' is in the way of '/nix/store/6p3hzdbzhad8ra5j1qf4b2b3hs6as6sf-home-manager-files/.config/Trolltech.conf'
Existing file '/home/user/.config/user-dirs.conf' is in the way of '/nix/store/6p3hzdbzhad8ra5j1qf4b2b3hs6as6sf-home-manager-files/.config/user-dirs.conf'
...
#+end_example
The current solution to this is to delete or move the files mentioned so that home-manager can evaluate. Once the files are out of the way, just run =nix run home-manager/master -- switch --flake ~/.dotfiles#user= again and it should work!
