diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'doc/manual/src/expressions/build-script.md')
| -rw-r--r-- | doc/manual/src/expressions/build-script.md | 70 |
1 files changed, 0 insertions, 70 deletions
diff --git a/doc/manual/src/expressions/build-script.md b/doc/manual/src/expressions/build-script.md deleted file mode 100644 index b1eacae88..000000000 --- a/doc/manual/src/expressions/build-script.md +++ /dev/null @@ -1,70 +0,0 @@ -# Build Script - -Here is the builder referenced from Hello's Nix expression (stored in -`pkgs/applications/misc/hello/ex-1/builder.sh`): - -```bash -source $stdenv/setup ① - -PATH=$perl/bin:$PATH ② - -tar xvfz $src ③ -cd hello-* -./configure --prefix=$out ④ -make ⑤ -make install -``` - -The builder can actually be made a lot shorter by using the *generic -builder* functions provided by `stdenv`, but here we write out the build -steps to elucidate what a builder does. It performs the following steps: - -1. When Nix runs a builder, it initially completely clears the - environment (except for the attributes declared in the derivation). - This is done to prevent undeclared inputs from being used in the - build process. If for example the `PATH` contained `/usr/bin`, then - you might accidentally use `/usr/bin/gcc`. - - So the first step is to set up the environment. This is done by - calling the `setup` script of the standard environment. The - environment variable `stdenv` points to the location of the - standard environment being used. (It wasn't specified explicitly - as an attribute in Hello's Nix expression, but `mkDerivation` adds - it automatically.) - -2. Since Hello needs Perl, we have to make sure that Perl is in the - `PATH`. The `perl` environment variable points to the location of - the Perl package (since it was passed in as an attribute to the - derivation), so `$perl/bin` is the directory containing the Perl - interpreter. - -3. Now we have to unpack the sources. The `src` attribute was bound to - the result of fetching the Hello source tarball from the network, so - the `src` environment variable points to the location in the Nix - store to which the tarball was downloaded. After unpacking, we `cd` - to the resulting source directory. - - The whole build is performed in a temporary directory created in - `/tmp`, by the way. This directory is removed after the builder - finishes, so there is no need to clean up the sources afterwards. - Also, the temporary directory is always newly created, so you don't - have to worry about files from previous builds interfering with the - current build. - -4. GNU Hello is a typical Autoconf-based package, so we first have to - run its `configure` script. In Nix every package is stored in a - separate location in the Nix store, for instance - `/nix/store/9a54ba97fb71b65fda531012d0443ce2-hello-2.1.1`. Nix - computes this path by cryptographically hashing all attributes of - the derivation. The path is passed to the builder through the `out` - environment variable. So here we give `configure` the parameter - `--prefix=$out` to cause Hello to be installed in the expected - location. - -5. Finally we build Hello (`make`) and install it into the location - specified by `out` (`make install`). - -If you are wondering about the absence of error checking on the result -of various commands called in the builder: this is because the shell -script is evaluated with Bash's `-e` option, which causes the script to -be aborted if any command fails without an error check. |