diff --git a/configure.ac b/configure.ac
index 5a2526672..b550231cb 100644
--- a/configure.ac
+++ b/configure.ac
@@ -62,7 +62,7 @@ CXXFLAGS=
 AC_PROG_CC
 AC_PROG_CXX
 AC_PROG_CPP
-AX_CXX_COMPILE_STDCXX_14
+AX_CXX_COMPILE_STDCXX_17
 
 
 # Use 64-bit file system calls so that we can support files > 2 GiB.
diff --git a/src/libexpr/attr-set.hh b/src/libexpr/attr-set.hh
index 3119a1848..6c5fb21ad 100644
--- a/src/libexpr/attr-set.hh
+++ b/src/libexpr/attr-set.hh
@@ -4,6 +4,7 @@
 #include "symbol-table.hh"
 
 #include <algorithm>
+#include <optional>
 
 namespace nix {
 
@@ -63,6 +64,14 @@ public:
         return end();
     }
 
+    std::optional<Attr *> get(const Symbol & name)
+    {
+        Attr key(name, 0);
+        iterator i = std::lower_bound(begin(), end(), key);
+        if (i != end() && i->name == name) return &*i;
+        return {};
+    }
+
     iterator begin() { return &attrs[0]; }
     iterator end() { return &attrs[size_]; }