Nix on Microsoft Windows 10

Using nix, the functional package manager on the Windows Subsystem for Linux is fairly easy, however a couple of additional steps need to be done.

 

WARNING

An update is published, using wsl2 & NixOS in December 2023.

1. Enable WSL, see Windows Subsystem for Linux Installation Guide for Windows 10
2. Pick Ubuntu inside the Microsoft Store
3. Update Ubuntu

    sudo apt update
    sudo apt upgrade
   

4. Create the /etc/nix directory

     mkdir -p /etc/nix
   

5. Create & edit /etc/nix/nix.conf, add following items:

    sandbox = false
    use-sqlite-wal = false
   

   Unfortunately there are still some things that require this workaround:

   • sandbox = false is following bug: NixOS/nix#2651: Installing Nix fails on Ubuntu 18.04.1 LTS Error: cloning builder process: Invalid argument
   • use-sqlite-wal = false are following bugs: NixOS/nix#2292: WSL Nix installation db.sqlite is busy and NixOS/nix#1203: nix-shell under Windows WSL is broken
6. Install nix:

    curl -L https://nixos.org/nix/install | sh
   

You are done, let’s test it:

  nix-shell -p busybox --run 'echo $PATH'

Some extra useful links:

• tweag.io: Nix on the Windows Subsystem for Linux
• nixos.org/nix