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
This means you now get an error message *before* stuff gets built:
$ nix copy .#hydraJobs.vendoredCrates
error: you must pass '--from' and/or '--to'
Try 'nix --help' for more information.
Most functions now take a StorePath argument rather than a Path (which
is just an alias for std::string). The StorePath constructor ensures
that the path is syntactically correct (i.e. it looks like
<store-dir>/<base32-hash>-<name>). Similarly, functions like
buildPaths() now take a StorePathWithOutputs, rather than abusing Path
by adding a '!<outputs>' suffix.
Note that the StorePath type is implemented in Rust. This involves
some hackery to allow Rust values to be used directly in C++, via a
helper type whose destructor calls the Rust type's drop()
function. The main issue is the dynamic nature of C++ move semantics:
after we have moved a Rust value, we should not call the drop function
on the original value. So when we move a value, we set the original
value to bitwise zero, and the destructor only calls drop() if the
value is not bitwise zero. This should be sufficient for most types.
Also lots of minor cleanups to the C++ API to make it more modern
(e.g. using std::optional and std::string_view in some places).
This replaces nix-push. For example,
$ nix copy --to file:///tmp/cache -r $(type -p firefox)
copies the closure of firefox to the specified binary cache. And
$ nix copy --from file:///tmp/cache --to s3://my-cache /nix/store/abcd...
copies between two binary caches.
It will also replace nix-copy-closure, once we have an SSHStore class,
e.g.
$ nix copy --from ssh://alice@machine /nix/store/abcd...