my dotfiles <3
- modules/ - configuration "modules"---groups of nixpkgs modules that are independent of one
another and as such, can be mixed and matched freely
- categories/ - abstract groups of system configuration that isn't specific to any device
- devices/ - system configuration used on specific hosts
- hardware/ - system configuration related to specific configurations of hardware
- users/ - configuration for specific user accounts
you can already figure this out from the device-specific configuration files, but here is an easier-to-understand breakdown of how the individual devices are partitioned, along with justification of various design choices and documentation of how things were done
owo---my pi3---currently has a partition layout that looks a little like this (on a 32gb sdcard)
| partition | filesystem | size | purpose |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | fat32 | 30m | boot partition containing u-boot for the pi's bootloader |
| 1 | swap | 4gb | to allow for system rebuilds to be done on-device |
| 2 | ext4 | remainder | root partition |
i've found throughout my usage of nixos on it that swap space is very necessary, due to the lack of sufficient ram to complete system upgrades without any
i feel that it's also necessary to note that this was not installed using the official sdcard image, it was instead generated using a tweaked configuration (not in this repository, but the only change was enabling root login in sshd, iirc) and this tool
uwu---my thinkpad t440p---has a partition layout lacking any swap whatsoever
| partition | filesystem | size | purpose |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | fat32 | 500m | efi system partition |
| 1 | luks2 | remainder | partial disk encryption |
| 1.0 | ext4 | remainder | root partition |
keep in mind that this is on a 500gb samsung ssd. that, along with the fact that i already have 16gb of ram, is why there is no swap partition
there are more goals i have listed elsewhere, but here are some big ones that i'm okay sharing
a good place to start would be here. ideally, anything done shouldn't affect performance too much
one place to start looking at is this
repository, however, an actual implementation of it
would likely not use this module, as i can get more flexibility handling the persistence of it
myself. after implementing persistence, i should also consider switching to zfs and having /nix/store or
the entirety of /nix stored in a compressed zpool (with zstd.)
ideally, everything would be configured through nix, but some things (mainly user account passwords) have been neglected, mostly due to the problems inherent with storing any kind of secret online. however, i feel that there is a way i could do this without exposing them in this git repository
currently, it is impossible to directly install the system from the installer iso, mainly due to
the lack of full flake support in the nixos-install command. find a way to circumvent this
problem, likely through supplanting the inbuilt installer with a custom one that handles flakes
correctly. a complete installer would also handle partitioning, to save even more time