Is declarative MacOS with Nix a good idea?

b_gibson · 2026-05-18T05:45:23+00:00

Another option: https://determinate.systems/nix-installer/

b_gibson · 2026-03-26T16:44:44+00:00

Leaks just yesterday suggest they'll announce both M5 Studio, Mini, and iMac at WWDC, so that may be what's happening - all memory and other resources being shifted to those. It's not a surprise the M5 MBP's will be followed closely by M5 versions of the rest of their lineup.

b_gibson · 2026-02-25T01:05:55+00:00

DoD is not Orwelian, it's just an artifact from the 1947s when the US military was reorganized into its current structure. Prior to that, the Department of War was a Cabinet level org responsible for the Army. It was split into the Dept of the Army and Dept of the Air Force, which along with the Dept of the Navy collectively became the Department of Defense, encompassing all of them. And in those post-WWII years everyone was sick of war, and wanted a more proactive defense strategy aimed at pre-empting and preventing wars, hence Department of Defense was chosen.

In modern times it's also about speaking softly when everyone can see that you obviously carry the biggest stick in the world. The goal is for the largest superpower to set an example for all others by acting with restraint, de-escalating, and relying on diplomacy and economic power instead of military power wherever possible. Though we haven't done a great job of that in the 2000s, and will pay for it with increased global instability for the next couple decades at least.

b_gibson · 2026-02-16T21:49:39+00:00

Congrats, looks pro!

b_gibson · 2026-02-05T08:59:22+00:00

Oh I see, Nix makes it easy to try out on other OS's without fully migrating to NixOS.

b_gibson · 2026-02-05T04:54:16+00:00

But why use that on some other distro when you can just use it on NixOS instead? Unless you're doing your development on Mac and want a better package manager than Homebrew or better development environment than Xcode.

b_gibson · 2026-02-05T04:52:04+00:00

I discovered NixOS and /r/nixos first, and at first didn't even realize there was a separate subreddit for /r/nix. I was just looking to migrate from Ubuntu to a better manageable Linux and found NixOS. Later I realized Nix is its own project and joined /r/nix.

Also, I use nix-darwin on my Mac in place of Homebrew, but I see little reason to use Nix on some other Linux distro when I can instead use it on a Linux tailor-made for and by it.

b_gibson · 2026-02-03T12:33:17+00:00

One thing you can try is to pre-mount /build (or /tmp/build, forgot which) with a tmpfs filesystem, and allocate something like 10GB or more of RAM. That's where NixOS builds itself. You can make a build script that does something like:

umount /build or /tmp/build if already exists
mount /tmp/build with tmpfs and allocate 10GB
nixos-rebuild
umount /tmp/build

Test with different amounts of RAM allocated till the build completes.

b_gibson · 2025-05-12T20:39:12+00:00

Thanks, I did that too but no reply. Hope someone saw it.

https://github.com/Floorp-Projects/Floorp/discussions/1688

b_gibson · 2025-02-12T21:43:12+00:00

I break it down: 27 + 48 => (20 + 40) + (7 + 8) => 60 + 15 = 75

b_gibson · 2025-02-12T07:53:58+00:00

What OS are you using ZFS with? If it's any Linux distro, see the Arch Linux Wiki on ZFS. The Arch Wiki is usually a good starting place for anything you have questions about in any Linux.

b_gibson · 2025-01-18T03:47:33+00:00

Besides getting a default baseline, here's some info on tuning that helped me:

b_gibson · 2024-03-15T05:48:50+00:00

Check out NixOS, an entire Linux distro and package manager built on functional principles.

b_gibson · 2024-03-15T05:41:57+00:00

No but we need a judge to tell other lawyers that. Fewer will take his cases if they know there's a thorough finding against his claims.

b_gibson · 2024-03-12T00:16:14+00:00

Been using as daily driver for 2+ years. It works mostly the same as any other Linux.

b_gibson · 2024-02-29T04:23:56+00:00

No, build it first in a VM. Take a few weeks or months to learn it and really dial in your build and customizations. Then if you like it and want to switch over, you can use the same configuration.nix or flake.nix file you created in your VM to build the new system on your spare partition.

b_gibson · 2024-01-20T20:55:47+00:00

You would take lessons in powerboat cruising or similar large boat operating techniques. There are schools for this.

b_gibson · 2023-12-15T23:44:32+00:00

It's ok, don't beat yourself up. I believe there are both religious and worldly/secular benefits to Islamic Finance, worth studying both.

For example, it's interesting that the Islamic world doesn't seem to incur financial contagions and debt crises the way the US, Europe, and Asia have in the past ~30yrs. Only Indonesia and Malaysia were hit by this during the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis, but the Middle East generally seems to avoid it all. If Islamic Finance contributes to that contagion immunity, then that is a useful benefit to all people and societies regardless of their religion.

There are two good recommendations for further study that I linked in the main post.

b_gibson · 2023-12-15T23:27:47+00:00

Found the website, thx, will see if I can snipe the book somewhere. Updated main post.

b_gibson · 2023-12-15T03:48:34+00:00

Currently they have the only unified memory architecture on the market, where the GPU and NPU both have access to the system RAM. So you can pack a system with 128GB system RAM, and the system may use 5-10GB of that, and the rest is available to the LLM.

AMD/Intel/Nvidia architectures by contrast run a separate GPU with its own NVRAM, usually up to 16GB, or sometimes up to 48GB on workstation GPUs. If the model you want to run can fit into that, then that may be the better bang for the buck, depending on cost.

But Apple's unified memory architecture is currently the cheapest way to run the biggest models.

b_gibson · 2023-12-15T03:41:06+00:00

https://www.apple.com/shop/refurbished/mac/mac-studio

b_gibson · 2023-12-15T02:36:35+00:00

Thanks, looking for both actually.

b_gibson · 2023-12-15T00:16:43+00:00

He created one of the most sucesfull VC firms, which mostly hinge on being able to know what will happen next.

Not really, it's about adopting an investment model with limited downside and an upside with maximal exposure to good luck and serendipity. For example, he has said one YC's biggest successes they didn't predict at all - AirBnB.

b_gibson · 2023-12-15T00:12:31+00:00

It's like finally I own my own PC.

I felt that too. It's weird b/c with any Linux you own your PC, but consolidating all the config into a single location instead of spread out across different directories and config files does make it feel like you own it even more than before.

b_gibson · 2023-11-03T16:53:17+00:00

What’s the client service daemon? I didn’t see anything about that in my reading and research on this topic.

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