[Leviathan]

Heyo,
before we talk about NixOS, I should probably talk about my background with linux.
I've been using linux since ~2014, been using Ubuntu, Arch and a tiny bit of Fedora so I'd say I know my way around linux.

My NixOS journey started around 2 months ago.
Why? Well mostly because I love the idea of having a fully declarative system that I can just nuke whenever I feel like I need to.
I started with watching some videos from Vimjoyer to get the basic grasp of it including flakes and home-manager. Which was not as confusing as people made it out to be. Slowly but surely I started building my own proper system.
Did I run into issues? Yes I did! A few of them actually, starting with steam... I didn't know I had to add

Code:

    remotePlay.openFirewall = true;
    dedicatedServer.openFirewall = true;
    localNetworkGameTransfers.openFirewall = true;

to the programs.steam part (see https://nixos.wiki/wiki/Steam)
Afterwards I was trying to get VR working on steam with SteamVR and my HTC Vive (also I'm using an AMD GPU & CPU) which was a WHOLE different issue. I can't pinpoint what actually made it work but my whole steam.nix (using flake + home-manager) is in the spoiler. So if you got struggles using VR with nix, that's for you!

Spoiler:

Code:

{ pkgs, ... }:
{
  hardware.steam-hardware.enable = true;
  programs.steam = {
    enable = true;
    remotePlay.openFirewall = true; # Open ports in the firewall for Steam Remote Play
    dedicatedServer.openFirewall = true; # Open ports in the firewall for Source Dedicated Server
    localNetworkGameTransfers.openFirewall = true; # Open ports in the firewall for Steam Local Network Game Transfers
  };

  # OpenGL and Vulkan configuration
  hardware.graphics.enable = true;
  hardware.graphics.extraPackages = with pkgs; [
    vulkan-loader
    vulkan-tools
  ];

  # Add system packages for VR support
  environment.systemPackages = with pkgs; [
    openvr # Required for SteamVR
    libusb1 # Used for VR devices
    usbutils
    pkgs.libsndfile
    pkgs.xwayland
  ];

  # Udev rules for VR devices
  services.udev.packages = with pkgs; [
    openvr
  ];

  services.udev.extraRules = ''
    # HTC Vive
    SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="0bb4", ATTR{idProduct}=="2c87", MODE="0666", GROUP="plugdev"
    SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="28de", ATTR{idProduct}=="2101", MODE="0666", GROUP="plugdev"
    SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="28de", ATTR{idProduct}=="2000", MODE="0666", GROUP="plugdev"
  '';
}

After that, I started transfering my waybar, swaync and some other configs into .nix files... which was much much easier than I thought. It's as simple as:

Code:

home.file.".path/to/file".text = '' config here '';

So far the whole setup took me around a week or two, there is probably much more I need to learn but that will be something for the next time.

Not sure if it will help anyone but I'd gladly help if anyone got any questions!

//Update
I just recieved my quest 3 yesterday and I'm happy to say that also quest 3 works perfectly fine using ALVR.

[Drako]

I've been using NixOS for about 4 months now and have been enjoying it a lot. Since all configuration is declarative, I know that none of my configurations within the scope of nix will be changed without my permission. I've been using the unstable repository branch, which is pretty stable actually. So far I've only had one issue affect me.

Vimjoyer's videos were also helpful for getting started. I certainly wouldn't recommend Nix to a new Linux user, or anyone looking for a distribution that "just works."

[laininthewired]

I have always been big on "just works", but I have been considering a more bleeding edge OS to play with. My friends use Nix and I would honestly say from what I saw that I totally wouldn't mind it for semi-daily use. Might install it on a spare ThinkPad I have.

[Leviathan]

I've been using NixOS for about 4 months now and have been enjoying it a lot. Since all configuration is declarative, I know that none of my configurations within the scope of nix will be changed without my permission. I've been using the unstable repository branch, which is pretty stable actually. So far I've only had one issue affect me.

Vimjoyer's videos were also helpful for getting started. I certainly wouldn't recommend Nix to a new Linux user, or anyone looking for a distribution that "just works."

Oh gladly I didn't encounter that issue so far.
Yeah NixOS is probably not something for fairly new linux users indeed.
Also I'm also on the unstable branch, added chaotic nyx repo for the CachyOS kernel too, it's quite freaking good !

Also laininthewired, NixOS is really only close to bleeding edge on the unstable branch so keep that in mind .
Overall it's really fun to tinker with and as soon as you get it to work just push your config to a repo and you're set!

[Drako]

Oh gladly I didn't encounter that issue so far.
Yeah NixOS is probably not something for fairly new linux users indeed.
Also I'm also on the unstable branch, added chaotic nyx repo for the CachyOS kernel too, it's quite freaking good !

It caused my file manager, Yazi, to not run for about a few days. A pretty niche issue. I'm not sure if any other packages were affected because of it.

I used to care a lot about performance. When I was using Gentoo I applied patches constantly, hoping for better throughput or latency somehow. To a certain extent it's just a waste of time. There are only a few switches I mess with these days. It's less headache that way.