endpoint for experimental installer

[abathur]

Hi @NixOS/marketing-team,

Not sure what we'll need to close the gap(s) here, but we hope to get releases of https://github.com/NixOS/experimental-nix-installer hosted under nixos.org. (Not replacing existing installer endpoints--it should clearly be an experiment.)

There's background in the infra issue we opened earlier this year:

• Host experimental-nix-installer binaries infra#452

Reaching out as the infra team suggested in issue above now that we have a release workflow set up.

The current tentative prerelease should be accessible via something like:

curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf -L https://github.com/NixOS/experimental-nix-installer/releases/download/0.27.0/nix-installer.sh | sh -s -- --help

I'm not sure how ~controlled the sanctioning of a latest release should be, but I did also briefly un-toggle the prerelease status in order to confirm the latest release per github would also be accessible as:

curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf -L https://github.com/NixOS/experimental-nix-installer/releases/latest/download/nix-installer.sh | sh -s -- --help

(I toggled it back to prerelease since we've already had people ~depend on this installer as we work, making me skittish about leaving a normal release sitting around for unknown amount of time without a clear go-ahead.)

cc @tomberek @roberth @mkenigs

[nixos-discourse]

This issue has been mentioned on NixOS Discourse. There might be relevant details there:

https://discourse.nixos.org/t/nix-installer-workgroup/21495/31

[Mic92]

Ok. Will see what it takes to make it happen. I should have access to most of the resources needed for this. For website contents we can just make pull requests.

[Mic92]

@abathur should we just make this a redirect on the homepage to github or do you want to upload this to NixOS own homepage?

[abathur]

@Mic92 Jonas suggested a redirect in NixOS/infra#452 (comment), and I'm inclined to defer to anyone with a clear opinion on it for now :)

(I'm unsure if a redirect directly to GH is how we'd want to handle this permanently if adopted as the official installer, but I think it is as good a place to start as any. I suspect it'll be easier to have a better version of this conversation nearer official adoption when more stakeholders are up to speed, if that makes sense.)

(also cc @idabzo @mkenigs @tomberek since we discussed this about an hour ago in the installer WG meeting)

[Mic92]

Ok. I finished my research. First we need a redirect on the homepage:

This is just a file here:

https://github.com/NixOS/nixos-homepage/blob/f24bea80eebb99c1bc8c6ca17b6b9140acb75165/public/netlify.toml#L447C11-L447C24

Than I would create you a new s3 bucket where you can upload releases. Maybe actually put fastly in front because our current nix release bucket is directly exposed to the internet. If we make the experimental installer the new default we can take the fastly configuration and put it front of our current s3 release bucket as well and the installer would be directly uploaded to the normal release buckets instead of the current nix releases we create.

[Mic92]

Instead of handing out s3 credentials, I could also use the opportunity to make the github repository in github actions authenticate against the release bucket using oicd. Something I meant to do for the new normal nix repository. That would also simplify the release process in future.

[mkenigs]

@Mic92 do you prefer that approach of uploading to s3 rather than just adding a redirect? I think we're fine with either, just want to make sure that if it's easier to just do a redirect you know we're fine with that too

[Mic92]

The idea also came up to just have fastly as a proxy in front of github releases.
I just don't want github only because it doesn't do ipv6 also having some indirection allows to move to something else if needed. Fastly also had better uptime so far than github.

[thilobillerbeck]

@abathur should we just make this a redirect on the homepage to github or do you want to upload this to NixOS own homepage?

I guess a redirect would be better and would cause less interference

[thilobillerbeck]

Btw. just ping me if you need any help or advice. I interpreted this issue more like a self containing thing that worked on its own or a note, since getting things hosted under nixos.org is a rather loose term and does not directly mean hosting on the nixos homepage, which btw. is something we should avoid (and just use redirects).

[abathur]

getting things hosted under nixos.org is a rather loose term

Yes--intentionally just asking for a broad outcome (the experimental installer is available via nixos.org or some subdomain thereof).

I'm not sure what's ideal (especially since these might differ between the clearly-marked experiment stage and final adoption) and want to avoid misguiding that discussion by being too specific.