devops@home

NixOS yeeeeaaaahhhh!

How to create a NixOS installation media

Build ISO:

nix build .#nixosConfigurations.iso-desktop.config.system.build.isoImage

Copy it to the USB drive from result/iso via dd or usbimager.

How to install NixOS

Boot the NixOS installer ISO. Check that you can connect to the machine via SSH.

Get a machine's public AGE key from the host SSH keys:

nix-shell -p ssh-to-age --run 'ssh-keyscan x.x.x.x | ssh-to-age'

Save this key to the .sops.yaml. setup secrets/<hostname>.yaml with all needed secrets.

Run something like this:

nixos-anywhere -f .#name --copy-host-keys \
  --disk-encryption-keys /tmp/disk.key /tmp/deploy/disk.key \
  --target-host [email protected]`

Where:

• name is nixosConfiguration's name
• /tmp/deploy/disk.key contains initial LUKS password.

Login to the machine after reboot.