* Poorly-implemented versions of theoretically-interesting ideas
* Poor implementations, technically
* Lacking merit compared to its best competitor (insofar as free software has competitors)
* Lacking merit compared to its main competitor
* Deep philosophical and moral disagreements
* Toxic and obnoxious community
This isn't to say it's bad, of course. It's just something I dislike; I seek no wider war.
Why is it poorly implemented, what are the problems?
Who is the competitor, and why is it better? (Guix?)
What are the philosophical issues?
How is the community toxic and obnoxius?
Personally there are a few things that annoy me about Nix, mostly implementation and documentation wise. Also, the language is pretty odd and the CLI UX is somewhat messy.
But the community (IRC / Discourse) has been pretty helpful for me thus far.
However, I will note that I listed two competitors, not one, and while I think both have more merit, I only think the best is worth using out of all three. I'll point out that it's not Guix, and that it's older than Nix, but I don't think advertising alternatives is a particularly nice thing to do in a thread about any given piece of free software.
It's a little too late for that. Complaining in a vague way across several comments and then not elaborating further is, I think, definitely more rude than making some concrete complaint (like the original comment's complaint about learning something new)
I said I didn't like something as a way of making it clear that I'm not trying to brigade for Nix and don't really have any incentive to defend it, and I gave an argument on why I believe the initial comment was being unfairly negative to Nix.
I was then asked why I disliked Nix. I made no complaints, I just listed my opinions. When I was asked to go into actual complaints implying fact rather than personal opinions, I said I'd prefer not to.
I don't think throwing unsubstantiated claims around is a particularly nice thing to do. I don't mind you having these opinions. But if you're not ready to properly argue them, it's probably better to just abstain from the discussion entirely. That's how I handle my own opinions as well.
I'd be perfectly happy to argue for them, but I don't think this is the right place to do it. Frankly, I don't care about how you handle your own opinions. When I am asked about my own, I'll tell them. I won't try and sell them as factual to anyone else, though, which is what going into more detail would require me doing in this particular instance.
Please substantiate - I'm not involved in the Nix community much but whenever I've been in the #nixos IRC channel, they've been super helpful.
- It can't be GoboLinux, because that post-dates Nix (by a small amount)
- I've never heard anyone suggest environment modules have more technical merit than Nix, though they do predate Nix
- Could it be portage, which has some of the same features as Nix? Nix explicitly cited portage as a predecessor, and IMO it surpasses it, so that would be surprising...
I really don't know anything other than Nix or Guix that follows Nix's philosophy. I'm really interested to know what you're referring to!