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authorAlexander Bantyev <balsoft@balsoft.ru>2021-11-17 23:35:21 +0300
committerAlexander Bantyev <balsoft@balsoft.ru>2023-02-10 20:14:06 +0400
commit2384d360839e27edb3c928da858ec911415c8b4d (patch)
tree95e5360fc7016b9d171f4bad320486eda168bbb1 /doc/manual/src/command-ref/env-common.md
parenta31d7d4e5e5eeeb7ca12ca798dc383045e5be1a1 (diff)
A setting to follow XDG Base Directory standard
XDG Base Directory is a standard for locations for storing various files. Nix has a few files which seem to fit in the standard, but currently use a custom location directly in the user's ~, polluting it: - ~/.nix-profile - ~/.nix-defexpr - ~/.nix-channels This commit adds a config option (use-xdg-base-directories) to follow the XDG spec and instead use the following locations: - $XDG_STATE_HOME/nix/profile - $XDG_STATE_HOME/nix/defexpr - $XDG_STATE_HOME/nix/channels If $XDG_STATE_HOME is not set, it is assumed to be ~/.local/state. Co-authored-by: Théophane Hufschmitt <7226587+thufschmitt@users.noreply.github.com> Co-authored-by: Tim Fenney <kodekata@gmail.com> Co-authored-by: pasqui23 <pasqui23@users.noreply.github.com> Co-authored-by: Artturin <Artturin@artturin.com> Co-authored-by: John Ericson <Ericson2314@Yahoo.com>
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diff --git a/doc/manual/src/command-ref/env-common.md b/doc/manual/src/command-ref/env-common.md
index bb85a6b07..c5d38db47 100644
--- a/doc/manual/src/command-ref/env-common.md
+++ b/doc/manual/src/command-ref/env-common.md
@@ -91,3 +91,16 @@ Most Nix commands interpret the following environment variables:
variable sets the initial size of the heap in bytes. It defaults to
384 MiB. Setting it to a low value reduces memory consumption, but
will increase runtime due to the overhead of garbage collection.
+
+## XDG Base Directory
+
+New Nix commands conform to the [XDG Base Directory Specification], and use the following environment variables to determine locations of various state and configuration files:
+
+- [`XDG_CONFIG_HOME`]{#env-XDG_CONFIG_HOME} (default `~/.config`)
+- [`XDG_STATE_HOME`]{#env-XDG_STATE_HOME} (default `~/.local/state`)
+- [`XDG_CACHE_HOME`]{#env-XDG_CACHE_HOME} (default `~/.cache`)
+
+Classic Nix commands can also be made to follow this standard using the [`use-xdg-base-directories`] configuration option.
+
+[XDG Base Directory Specification]: https://specifications.freedesktop.org/basedir-spec/basedir-spec-latest.html
+[`use-xdg-base-directories`]: ../command-ref/conf-file.md#conf-use-xdg-base-directories \ No newline at end of file