In case of pure input-addressed derivations, the build loop doesn't
guaranty that the realisations are stored in the db (if the output paths
are already there or can be substituted, the realisations won't be
registered). This caused `nix shell` to fail in some cases because it
was assuming that the realisations were always existing.
A better (but more involved) fix would probably to ensure that we always
register the realisations, but in the meantime this patches the surface
issue.
Fix#4721
I think that it's not very helpful to get "cached failures" in a wrong
`flake.nix`. This can be very confusing when debugging a Nix expression.
See for instance NixOS/nixpkgs#118115.
In fact, the eval cache allows a forced reevaluation which is used for
e.g. `nix eval`.
This change makes sure that this is the case for `nix build` as well. So
rather than
λ ma27 [~/Projects/exp] → ../nix/outputs/out/bin/nix build -L --rebuild --experimental-features 'nix-command flakes'
error: cached failure of attribute 'defaultPackage.x86_64-linux'
the evaluation of already-evaluated (and failed) attributes looks like
this now:
λ ma27 [~/Projects/exp] → ../nix/outputs/out/bin/nix build -L --rebuild --experimental-features 'nix-command flakes'
error: attribute 'hell' missing
at /nix/store/mrnvi9ss8zn5wj6gpn4bcd68vbh42mfh-source/flake.nix:6:35:
5|
6| packages.x86_64-linux.hello = nixpkgs.legacyPackages.x86_64-linux.hell;
| ^
7|
(use '--show-trace' to show detailed location information)
This avoids an ambiguity where the `StorePathWithOutputs { drvPath, {}
}` could mean "build `brvPath`" or "substitute `drvPath`" depending on
context.
It also brings the internals closer in line to the new CLI, by
generalizing the `Buildable` type is used there and makes that
distinction already.
In doing so, relegate `StorePathWithOutputs` to being a type just for
backwards compatibility (CLI and RPC).
Where a `RealisedPath` is a store path with its history, meaning either
an opaque path for stuff that has been directly added to the store, or a
`Realisation` for stuff that has been built by a derivation
This is a low-level refactoring that doesn't bring anything by itself
(except a few dozen extra lines of code :/ ), but raising the
abstraction level a bit is important on a number of levels:
- Commands like `nix build` have to query for the realisations after the
build is finished which is fragile (see
27905f12e4a7207450abe37c9ed78e31603b67e1 for example). Having them
oprate directly at the realisation level would avoid that
- Others like `nix copy` currently operate directly on (built) store
paths, but need a bit more information as they will need to register
the realisations on the remote side
Maximilian Bosch