[jackhill/guix/guix.git] / TODO

-*- mode: org; coding: utf-8; -*-

Copyright © 2012 Ludovic Courtès <ludo@gnu.org>

  Copying and distribution of this file, with or without modification,
  are permitted in any medium without royalty provided the copyright
  notice and this notice are preserved.

* integrate needed Nix code

Guix uses Nix’s daemon (‘nix-worker’, later renamed to ‘nix-daemon’) to
actually perform builds, scheduling, substitution of pre-built binaries,
and GC-related tasks.  The daemon mainly uses ‘libstore’ from Nix.
Integrating it in Guix itself will make Guix self-contained, thereby
simplifying our users’ lives.

* infrastructure

** have a Hydra instance build Guix packages

[[http://nixos.org/hydra/][Hydra]] is a continuous integration tool based on Nix.  It now has
[[https://github.com/NixOS/hydra/commit/f27ae1d5663680400cb99cfb898970f34d8d21be][Guile/Guix support]], which allows “build recipes” written in Guile using
Guix to be used directly on Hydra.

For a start, we may use the instance at hydra.nixos.org, generously
provided by TU Delft.  However, in the future, we may want to setup our
own instance at gnu.org.

* extend <origin>
** add OpenPGP signatures:

   (origin
     (method http-fetch)
     (uri "http://.../foo.tgz")
     (signature-uri (string-append uri ".sig"))
     (signer-openpgp-fingerprint "..."))

** allow <origin> to be a derivation/package or a file

* extend <package>

** add support for ‘search-paths’

This should be passed to the build system, to extend package-specific
search path environment variables–like ‘GUILE_LOAD_PATH’, ‘PERL5LIB’,
etc.

** add a ‘user-environment-hook’

This should specify builder code to be run when building a user
environment with ‘guix-package’.  For instance, Texinfo’s hook would
create a new ‘dir’.

* support cross-compilation

Implement ‘package-cross-derivation’, and add the corresponding code in
‘gnu-build-system’.  Then, actually bootstrap a cross-compilation
environment–e.g., a cross-GNU environment.

* gnu-build-system: produce a ‘debug’ derivation

Set a .gnu_debuglink in the main derivations to point to the sibling
file name (only the basename, to not retain a dependency on the ‘debug’
derivation.)

For /nix/store/xyz-foobar/bin/foo, we should have
/nix/store/abc-foobar-debug/lib/nix/store/xyz-foobar/bin/foo.debug (info
"(gdb) Separate Debug Files").

Users should have a default GDB setting with ~/.guix-profile/lib/debug
as their ‘debug-file-directory’.

* build-expression->derivation: define `%system' in the builder

Would allow build expressions to have system-dependent code, like
`glibc-dynamic-linker'.

* add ‘allowed-references’ in <package>

[[file:~/src/nix/src/libstore/build.cc::if%20(drv.env.find("allowedReferences")%20!%3D%20drv.env.end())%20{][See how Nix implements that internally]].


* union

Support sophisticated collision handling when building a union: check
whether the colliding files are identical, honor per-package priorities,
etc.

* guix-package

** add ‘--roll-back’
** add ‘--list-generations’, and ‘--delete-generations’
** add ‘--upgrade’
** add ‘--list-installed’ and ‘--list-available’
** add ‘--search’

* guix build utils
** Add equivalent to "rm -rf"
** Add equivalent to Nixpkgs's ‘wrapProgram’
** Add equivalent to chrpath, possibly using [[https://gitorious.org/guile-dlhacks/guile-dlhacks/][guile-dlhacks]]

* distro
** choose a name! (Jinn?)
** port to new GNU/Linux platforms, notably ‘mipsel64-linux’
** port to GNU/Hurd, aka. ‘i686-gnu’

Problems include that current glibc releases do not build on GNU/Hurd.
In addition, there haven’t been stable releases of GNU Mach, MiG, and
Hurd, which would be a pre-condition.

** make a bootable GNU/Linux-Libre distro, with OS configuration EDSL

Similar in spirit to /etc/nixos/configuration.nix.
Commit	Line	Data
6b8875c8 LC	1	-- mode: org; coding: utf-8; --
	2
	3	Copyright © 2012 Ludovic Courtès <ludo@gnu.org>
	4
	5	Copying and distribution of this file, with or without modification,
	6	are permitted in any medium without royalty provided the copyright
	7	notice and this notice are preserved.
	8
	9	* integrate needed Nix code
	10
	11	Guix uses Nix’s daemon (‘nix-worker’, later renamed to ‘nix-daemon’) to
	12	actually perform builds, scheduling, substitution of pre-built binaries,
	13	and GC-related tasks. The daemon mainly uses ‘libstore’ from Nix.
	14	Integrating it in Guix itself will make Guix self-contained, thereby
	15	simplifying our users’ lives.
	16
	17	* infrastructure
	18
	19	** have a Hydra instance build Guix packages
	20
	21	[[http://nixos.org/hydra/][Hydra]] is a continuous integration tool based on Nix. It now has
	22	[[https://github.com/NixOS/hydra/commit/f27ae1d5663680400cb99cfb898970f34d8d21be][Guile/Guix support]], which allows “build recipes” written in Guile using
	23	Guix to be used directly on Hydra.
	24
	25	For a start, we may use the instance at hydra.nixos.org, generously
	26	provided by TU Delft. However, in the future, we may want to setup our
	27	own instance at gnu.org.
	28
	29	* extend <origin>
	30	** add OpenPGP signatures:
	31
	32	(origin
	33	(method http-fetch)
	34	(uri "http://.../foo.tgz")
	35	(signature-uri (string-append uri ".sig"))
	36	(signer-openpgp-fingerprint "..."))
	37
	38	** allow <origin> to be a derivation/package or a file
	39
	40	* extend <package>
	41
	42	** add support for ‘search-paths’
	43
	44	This should be passed to the build system, to extend package-specific
	45	search path environment variables–like ‘GUILE_LOAD_PATH’, ‘PERL5LIB’,
	46	etc.
	47
	48	** add a ‘user-environment-hook’
	49
	50	This should specify builder code to be run when building a user
	51	environment with ‘guix-package’. For instance, Texinfo’s hook would
	52	create a new ‘dir’.
	53
	54	* support cross-compilation
	55
	56	Implement ‘package-cross-derivation’, and add the corresponding code in
	57	‘gnu-build-system’. Then, actually bootstrap a cross-compilation
	58	environment–e.g., a cross-GNU environment.
	59
	60	* gnu-build-system: produce a ‘debug’ derivation
	61
	62	Set a .gnu_debuglink in the main derivations to point to the sibling
	63	file name (only the basename, to not retain a dependency on the ‘debug’
	64	derivation.)
65
66	For /nix/store/xyz-foobar/bin/foo, we should have
67	/nix/store/abc-foobar-debug/lib/nix/store/xyz-foobar/bin/foo.debug (info
68	"(gdb) Separate Debug Files").
69
70	Users should have a default GDB setting with ~/.guix-profile/lib/debug
71	as their ‘debug-file-directory’.
72
73	* build-expression->derivation: define `%system' in the builder
74
75	Would allow build expressions to have system-dependent code, like
76	`glibc-dynamic-linker'.
77
78	* add ‘allowed-references’ in <package>
79
80	[[file:~/src/nix/src/libstore/build.cc::if%20(drv.env.find("allowedReferences")%20!%3D%20drv.env.end())%20{][See how Nix implements that internally]].
81
82
83	* union
84
85	Support sophisticated collision handling when building a union: check
86	whether the colliding files are identical, honor per-package priorities,
87	etc.
88
89	* guix-package
90
91	** add ‘--roll-back’
92	** add ‘--list-generations’, and ‘--delete-generations’
93	** add ‘--upgrade’
94	** add ‘--list-installed’ and ‘--list-available’
95	** add ‘--search’
96
97	* guix build utils
98	** Add equivalent to "rm -rf"
99	** Add equivalent to Nixpkgs's ‘wrapProgram’
100	** Add equivalent to chrpath, possibly using [[https://gitorious.org/guile-dlhacks/guile-dlhacks/][guile-dlhacks]]
101
102	* distro
103	** choose a name! (Jinn?)
104	** port to new GNU/Linux platforms, notably ‘mipsel64-linux’
105	** port to GNU/Hurd, aka. ‘i686-gnu’
106
107	Problems include that current glibc releases do not build on GNU/Hurd.
108	In addition, there haven’t been stable releases of GNU Mach, MiG, and
109	Hurd, which would be a pre-condition.
110
111	** make a bootable GNU/Linux-Libre distro, with OS configuration EDSL
112
113	Similar in spirit to /etc/nixos/configuration.nix.