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❄️ Nix Dotfiles (Darwin)

A declarative macOS system configuration using Nix Darwin and Home Manager.

Features

  • System Configuration: macOS system settings, security, and defaults
  • Application Management: Homebrew integration for GUI applications
  • Development Environment: Shell configuration, development tools, and programming languages
  • Dotfiles Management: Centralized configuration for CLI tools and applications
  • Profile Support: Easily add new profiles for different machines

Prerequisites

  1. Install macOS dependencies
xcode-select --install
/bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/HEAD/install.sh)"
  1. Install Determinate Nix using the Determinate Nix Installer
curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf -L https://install.determinate.systems/nix | \
sh -s -- install

Important

When prompted, choose to install Determinate Nix, not the regular Nix.

Then start a new shell session for nix to become available in $PATH.

Usage

  1. Clone this repository
git clone https://github.com/ryanmalonzo/dotfiles ~/dotfiles && \
cd ~/dotfiles
  1. Apply the configuration

For the first time setup:

sudo nix run nix-darwin -- switch --flake .

Or specify a specific profile with:

sudo nix run nix-darwin -- switch --flake .#<profile_name>

Note

After the initial setup, subsequent configuration updates must be run with sudo privileges.

For subsequent updates:

# Update and apply configuration (requires sudo)
sudo darwin-rebuild switch --flake .#<profile_name>

Common tasks

# Delete old generations
nix-collect-garbage -d

# Update all flake inputs
nix flake update

# Update specific input
nix flake lock --update-input nixpkgs
nix flake lock --update-input home-manager

# Update to a new Nix version (e.g., 25.05 to 25.11)
# 1. Update version numbers in flake.nix (e.g., nixos-25.05 -> nixos-25.11)
# 2. Fetch new dependency versions
nix flake update
# 3. Apply the updated configuration
sudo nix run nix-darwin -- switch --flake .#<profile_name>

Troubleshooting

Permission Issues

If you encounter permission errors during cleanup operations (like uninstalling applications), you may need to:

  1. Enable Full Disk Access for your terminal application
  2. Go to System Settings → Privacy & Security → Full Disk Access
  3. Add your terminal application (Terminal.app, iTerm2, etc.)

Environment Variables

After applying configuration changes, you may need to:

  • Restart your terminal application, or
  • Run source ~/.zshrc to reload environment variables

Some changes (like npm configuration) may require a new shell session to take effect.

Adding a profile

  1. Add an entry to the profiles attrset in flake.nix:
work = {
  username = "your.username";
  homeDirectory = "/Users/your.username";
  hostConfigPath = ./hosts/work.nix;
  homeConfigPath = ./home/work.nix;
};
  1. Create hosts/work.nix for host-level overrides (packages, hostname, Homebrew casks):
{ pkgs, ... }:
{
  config = {
    networking.computerName = "your-machine-name";

    environment.systemPackages = with pkgs; [
      # profile-specific packages
    ];
  };
}
  1. Create home/work.nix for home-manager overrides (username, git signing key):
{ ... }:
{
  home.username = "your.username";
  home.homeDirectory = "/Users/your.username";

  imports = [
    ./common.nix
    ../programs/git/work.nix
  ];
}
  1. Create programs/git/work.nix with the SSH signing key for that machine:
{ ... }:
{
  imports = [ ./common.nix ];

  programs.git.signing.key = "/Users/your.username/.ssh/git.pub";
}
  1. Apply:
sudo darwin-rebuild switch --flake .#work

Acknowledgements