Installer error on Google Project IDX, sudo command not found

[DeepakKumarKhatri]

Installer error on Google Project IDX, sudo command not found

[vkryachko]

Hi @DeepakKumarKhatri ,

I am on the IDX team and wanted to provide an answer here.

As already pointed out, you don't need to install nix on idx, it's already installed and available there, you are free to use the nix cli there and if your need a certain version that is different from the one we have installed by default, you can add it to your .idx/dev.nix file, e.g. pkgs.nixVersions.nix_2_XX however note that all builds will be handled by the daemon that as of today is at version 2.23.

That said, we don't require that developers build their code with nix, what we provide is a way for you to configure your developer toolchain/environment with nix, after that you're free to use the "native" build tools of your target platform, e.g. npm, gradle, maven, cargo, poetry, etc.

As for sudo, as @roberth correctly inferred, we don't currently provide sudo access and I would argue that it's for the most part useless inside IDX, i.e. you won't have write access to the filesystem outside of /home /tmp even with sudo. We have some ideas on relaxing these restrictions but it has not been prioritized as we've not seen much demand for it so far.

However one of the biggest hurdles with sudo is that it's ingrained in many developers' muscle memory so they naturally use sudo when it's actually not required, one such example.

If you have further questions feel free to ask them at https://community.idx.dev/

[roberth]

I believe IDX offers its own Nix integration, based on https://idx.dev/blog/article/nix-on-idx.
The article links this technical documentation as well.
I don't see any mention of using the nix command, so maybe what's going on is that IDX uses Nix to build a customizable but static environment that does not include Nix itself.
Nix already appears to be installed. in your installer log appears to contradict this, but that may just indicate the presence of aforementioned pre-built Nix store, or perhaps a previous failed installer run.

The lack of sudo indicates that you were not given sufficient control of the IDX environment, which is probably by design.
Considering that Google manages your Nix store, could you ask them whether this is a use case they support?

[thufschmitt]

Just to give more precision on the idx setup (as far as I know): it is indeed using Nix to install everything, and Nix should be available in the environment, but you're not supposed to install it yourself. Everything happens by modifying the .idx/dev.nix file mentioned here

Not sure what causes the "NIX NOT FOUND," message. It's probably related to the specific setup of IDX

[roberth]

@vkryachko Thank you for going the extra mile and explaining the status. That's much appreciated.

It doesn't seem there's anything left to do here, so I'll go ahead and close this. If you have any questions, feel free to ask.