Official NixOS Wiki:History - Revision history

Roxwize: fix external link (also, this bit seems a little unnecessarily spiteful and dismissive?)

2025-11-16T16:25:33Z

fix external link (also, this bit seems a little unnecessarily spiteful and dismissive?)

← Older revision		Revision as of 16:25, 16 November 2025
Line 9:		Line 9:
	To fill the void in the community contributor Jörg Thalheim (Mic92) started the [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki/wiki nixos-users wiki] on April 24th. Since Nixpkgs is hosted on GitHub, he opted to use the GitHub native wiki, allowing everybody who needed access to directly edit the wiki. This instance is known as the "first unofficial" wiki. Only a very small number of selected wiki articles were transferred from the original wiki.		To fill the void in the community contributor Jörg Thalheim (Mic92) started the [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki/wiki nixos-users wiki] on April 24th. Since Nixpkgs is hosted on GitHub, he opted to use the GitHub native wiki, allowing everybody who needed access to directly edit the wiki. This instance is known as the "first unofficial" wiki. Only a very small number of selected wiki articles were transferred from the original wiki.

	Not long after, user Tristan Helmich (fadenb) started his own approach to resurrect the wiki by setting up a MediaWiki on his own at [https://nixos.wiki], mostly out of frustration of the bad UX of the github wiki (no table of contents, no search, etc.). The Wiki went online somewhere before May 2017 "on a lazy day at work" but he forgot to tell anybody about it. The only documented announcement is the twitter message [https://twitter.com/fadenb/status/880045303403040768 "You can now log into https://nixos.wiki with your github account"] with 8 likes and no retweets. The Wiki now has captchas enabled.		Not long after, user Tristan Helmich (fadenb) started his own approach to resurrect the wiki by setting up a MediaWiki on his own at https://nixos.wiki/, mostly out of frustration of the bad UX of the github wiki (no table of contents, no search, etc.). The Wiki went online somewhere before May 2017 "on a lazy day at work" but he forgot to tell anybody about it. The only documented announcement is the twitter message [https://twitter.com/fadenb/status/880045303403040768 "You can now log into https://nixos.wiki with your github account"] with 8 likes and no retweets. The Wiki now has captchas enabled.

	[https://twitter.com/makefoo/status/899558842467569664 Discovering that project] on the 21st of August 2017, user Felix Richter (makefu) decided to just transfer all articles written for [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki the wiki as nixos-users] into the more powerful platform. With the migration of the old MediaWiki to the new MediaWiki the project went a full circle.		[https://twitter.com/makefoo/status/899558842467569664 Discovering that project] on the 21st of August 2017, user Felix Richter (makefu) decided to just transfer all articles written for [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki the wiki as nixos-users] into the more powerful platform. With the migration of the old MediaWiki to the new MediaWiki the project went a full circle.

Sdht0: Copyedit

2024-04-01T15:53:51Z

Copyedit

← Older revision		Revision as of 15:53, 1 April 2024
Line 13:		Line 13:
	[https://twitter.com/makefoo/status/899558842467569664 Discovering that project] on the 21st of August 2017, user Felix Richter (makefu) decided to just transfer all articles written for [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki the wiki as nixos-users] into the more powerful platform. With the migration of the old MediaWiki to the new MediaWiki the project went a full circle.		[https://twitter.com/makefoo/status/899558842467569664 Discovering that project] on the 21st of August 2017, user Felix Richter (makefu) decided to just transfer all articles written for [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki the wiki as nixos-users] into the more powerful platform. With the migration of the old MediaWiki to the new MediaWiki the project went a full circle.

	In January 2024, [https://github.com/NixOS/foundation/issues/113 ~~a discussion~~] ~~started~~ to revive an official wiki instance, and after a brief discussion culminated in the wiki instance you're reading this on.		In January 2024, [https://github.com/NixOS/foundation/issues/113 an initiative] to revive an official wiki instance was undertaken and after a brief discussion culminated in the wiki instance you're reading this on.

	[[Category:Pedias]]		[[Category:Pedias]]

Sdht0: Add latest developments

2024-04-01T15:51:52Z

Add latest developments

← Older revision		Revision as of 15:51, 1 April 2024
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	~~== The Modern Comedy of the NixOS Wiki ==~~

	Sometime around 2010-2011, members of the Nix community decided to [https://web.archive.org/web/20111006031605/http://nixos.org/wiki/Main_Page set up a wiki]. Everything went well until (supposedly) people lost interest in maintaining the Wiki, and the overall quality of the Wiki began to dwindle as obsolete information accumulated.		Sometime around 2010-2011, members of the Nix community decided to [https://web.archive.org/web/20111006031605/http://nixos.org/wiki/Main_Page set up a wiki]. Everything went well until (supposedly) people lost interest in maintaining the Wiki, and the overall quality of the Wiki began to dwindle as obsolete information accumulated.

Line 13:		Line 11:
	Not long after, user Tristan Helmich (fadenb) started his own approach to resurrect the wiki by setting up a MediaWiki on his own at [https://nixos.wiki], mostly out of frustration of the bad UX of the github wiki (no table of contents, no search, etc.). The Wiki went online somewhere before May 2017 "on a lazy day at work" but he forgot to tell anybody about it. The only documented announcement is the twitter message [https://twitter.com/fadenb/status/880045303403040768 "You can now log into https://nixos.wiki with your github account"] with 8 likes and no retweets. The Wiki now has captchas enabled.		Not long after, user Tristan Helmich (fadenb) started his own approach to resurrect the wiki by setting up a MediaWiki on his own at [https://nixos.wiki], mostly out of frustration of the bad UX of the github wiki (no table of contents, no search, etc.). The Wiki went online somewhere before May 2017 "on a lazy day at work" but he forgot to tell anybody about it. The only documented announcement is the twitter message [https://twitter.com/fadenb/status/880045303403040768 "You can now log into https://nixos.wiki with your github account"] with 8 likes and no retweets. The Wiki now has captchas enabled.

	[https://twitter.com/makefoo/status/899558842467569664 Discovering that project] on the 21st of August 2017, user Felix Richter (makefu) decided to just transfer all articles written for [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki the wiki as nixos-users] into the more powerful platform.		[https://twitter.com/makefoo/status/899558842467569664 Discovering that project] on the 21st of August 2017, user Felix Richter (makefu) decided to just transfer all articles written for [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki the wiki as nixos-users] into the more powerful platform. With the migration of the old MediaWiki to the new MediaWiki the project went a full circle.

	~~With the migration of the old MediaWiki~~ to the ~~new MediaWiki the project went a full circle~~.		In January 2024, [https://github.com/NixOS/foundation/issues/113 a discussion] started to revive an official wiki instance, and after a brief discussion culminated in the wiki instance you're reading this on.

	[[Category:Pedias]]		[[Category:Pedias]]

imported>Nix: move to pedias category

2021-09-20T00:23:52Z

move to pedias category

← Older revision		Revision as of 00:23, 20 September 2021
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	With the migration of the old MediaWiki to the new MediaWiki the project went a full circle.		With the migration of the old MediaWiki to the new MediaWiki the project went a full circle.

	[[Category:~~Discussion~~]]		[[Category:Pedias]]

imported>Ciil at 16:25, 30 October 2018

2018-10-30T16:25:47Z

← Older revision		Revision as of 16:25, 30 October 2018
Line 1:		Line 1:
	== The Modern Comedy of the NixOS Wiki ==		== The Modern Comedy of the NixOS Wiki ==

	Sometime around 2010-2011, members of the Nix community decided to [https://web.archive.org/web/20111006031605/http://nixos.org/wiki/Main_Page set up a wiki]. Everything went well until (supposedly) people lost interest in maintaining the Wiki, and the overall quality of the Wiki began to ~~dwindel~~ as obsolete information accumulated.		Sometime around 2010-2011, members of the Nix community decided to [https://web.archive.org/web/20111006031605/http://nixos.org/wiki/Main_Page set up a wiki]. Everything went well until (supposedly) people lost interest in maintaining the Wiki, and the overall quality of the Wiki began to dwindle as obsolete information accumulated.

	On the 14th of november 2015 Rok Garbas gave the infamous talk [https://media.ccc.de/v/nixcon2015-3-MakeNixfriendlierforBeginners#video&t=1365 "Make Nix Friendlier for Beginners"] which to future generations became known as the "Kill the Wiki" talk. This rekindled the discussion about the decaying state of the official Wiki. An [https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/issues/22599 epic mailing-list discussion] started 4 days later and some core developers seemed to agree that the Nix* manuals are a better place to put documentation, while others didn't.		On the 14th of november 2015 Rok Garbas gave the infamous talk [https://media.ccc.de/v/nixcon2015-3-MakeNixfriendlierforBeginners#video&t=1365 "Make Nix Friendlier for Beginners"] which to future generations became known as the "Kill the Wiki" talk. This rekindled the discussion about the decaying state of the official Wiki. An [https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/issues/22599 epic mailing-list discussion] started 4 days later and some core developers seemed to agree that the Nix* manuals are a better place to put documentation, while others didn't.
Line 11:		Line 11:
	To fill the void in the community contributor Jörg Thalheim (Mic92) started the [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki/wiki nixos-users wiki] on April 24th. Since Nixpkgs is hosted on GitHub, he opted to use the GitHub native wiki, allowing everybody who needed access to directly edit the wiki. This instance is known as the "first unofficial" wiki. Only a very small number of selected wiki articles were transferred from the original wiki.		To fill the void in the community contributor Jörg Thalheim (Mic92) started the [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki/wiki nixos-users wiki] on April 24th. Since Nixpkgs is hosted on GitHub, he opted to use the GitHub native wiki, allowing everybody who needed access to directly edit the wiki. This instance is known as the "first unofficial" wiki. Only a very small number of selected wiki articles were transferred from the original wiki.

	Not long after, user Tristan Helmich (fadenb) started his own approach to resurrect the wiki by setting up a MediaWiki on his own at [https://nixos.wiki], mostly out of frustration of the bad UX of the github wiki (no table of contents, no search, etc ). The Wiki went online somewhere before May 2017 "on a lazy day at work" but he forgot to tell anybody about it. The only documented announcement is the twitter message [https://twitter.com/fadenb/status/880045303403040768 "You can now log into https://nixos.wiki with your github account"] with 8 likes and no retweets. The Wiki now has captchas enabled.		Not long after, user Tristan Helmich (fadenb) started his own approach to resurrect the wiki by setting up a MediaWiki on his own at [https://nixos.wiki], mostly out of frustration of the bad UX of the github wiki (no table of contents, no search, etc.). The Wiki went online somewhere before May 2017 "on a lazy day at work" but he forgot to tell anybody about it. The only documented announcement is the twitter message [https://twitter.com/fadenb/status/880045303403040768 "You can now log into https://nixos.wiki with your github account"] with 8 likes and no retweets. The Wiki now has captchas enabled.

	[https://twitter.com/makefoo/status/899558842467569664 Discovering that project] on the 21st of August 2017, user Felix Richter (makefu) decided to just transfer all articles written for [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki the wiki as nixos-users] into the more powerful platform.		[https://twitter.com/makefoo/status/899558842467569664 Discovering that project] on the 21st of August 2017, user Felix Richter (makefu) decided to just transfer all articles written for [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki the wiki as nixos-users] into the more powerful platform.

imported>Vater: harmonizing (a wiki can be written "wiki", but the (project) wiki usually is written "Wiki" (aka capitalized))

2017-10-19T11:46:28Z

harmonizing (a wiki can be written "wiki", but the (project) wiki usually is written "Wiki" (aka capitalized))

← Older revision		Revision as of 11:46, 19 October 2017
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			== The Modern Comedy of the NixOS Wiki ==
	== The Modern Comedy of the NixOS ~~wiki~~ ==

	Sometime around 2010-2011, members of the Nix community decided to [https://web.archive.org/web/20111006031605/http://nixos.org/wiki/Main_Page set up a wiki]. Everything went well until (supposedly) people lost interest in maintaining the Wiki, and the overall quality of the Wiki began to dwindel as obsolete information accumulated.		Sometime around 2010-2011, members of the Nix community decided to [https://web.archive.org/web/20111006031605/http://nixos.org/wiki/Main_Page set up a wiki]. Everything went well until (supposedly) people lost interest in maintaining the Wiki, and the overall quality of the Wiki began to dwindel as obsolete information accumulated.
Line 12:		Line 11:
	To fill the void in the community contributor Jörg Thalheim (Mic92) started the [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki/wiki nixos-users wiki] on April 24th. Since Nixpkgs is hosted on GitHub, he opted to use the GitHub native wiki, allowing everybody who needed access to directly edit the wiki. This instance is known as the "first unofficial" wiki. Only a very small number of selected wiki articles were transferred from the original wiki.		To fill the void in the community contributor Jörg Thalheim (Mic92) started the [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki/wiki nixos-users wiki] on April 24th. Since Nixpkgs is hosted on GitHub, he opted to use the GitHub native wiki, allowing everybody who needed access to directly edit the wiki. This instance is known as the "first unofficial" wiki. Only a very small number of selected wiki articles were transferred from the original wiki.

	Not long after, user Tristan Helmich (fadenb) started his own approach to resurrect the wiki by setting up a ~~mediawiki~~ on his own at [https://nixos.wiki], mostly out of frustration of the bad UX of the github wiki (no table of contents, no search, etc ). The ~~wiki~~ went online somewhere before May 2017 "on a lazy day at work" but he forgot to tell anybody about it. The only documented announcement is the twitter message [https://twitter.com/fadenb/status/880045303403040768 "You can now log into https://nixos.wiki with your github account"] with 8 likes and no retweets. The ~~wiki~~ now has captchas enabled.		Not long after, user Tristan Helmich (fadenb) started his own approach to resurrect the wiki by setting up a MediaWiki on his own at [https://nixos.wiki], mostly out of frustration of the bad UX of the github wiki (no table of contents, no search, etc ). The Wiki went online somewhere before May 2017 "on a lazy day at work" but he forgot to tell anybody about it. The only documented announcement is the twitter message [https://twitter.com/fadenb/status/880045303403040768 "You can now log into https://nixos.wiki with your github account"] with 8 likes and no retweets. The Wiki now has captchas enabled.

	[https://twitter.com/makefoo/status/899558842467569664 Discovering that project] on the 21st of August 2017, user Felix Richter (makefu) decided to just transfer all articles written for the nixos-user wiki into the more powerful platform.

	~~With the migration of the old mediawiki to the new mediawiki the project went a full circle~~.

			[https://twitter.com/makefoo/status/899558842467569664 Discovering that project] on the 21st of August 2017, user Felix Richter (makefu) decided to just transfer all articles written for [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki the wiki as nixos-users] into the more powerful platform.

			With the migration of the old MediaWiki to the new MediaWiki the project went a full circle.

	[[Category:Discussion]]		[[Category:Discussion]]

imported>Vater: Vater moved page NixOS Wiki History to NixOS Wiki:History: the history is a (this) project (releated) thing

2017-10-19T09:36:03Z

Vater moved page NixOS Wiki History to NixOS Wiki:History: the history is a (this) project (releated) thing

← Older revision		Revision as of 09:36, 19 October 2017
(No difference)

imported>Makefu at 11:58, 30 August 2017

2017-08-30T11:58:02Z

← Older revision		Revision as of 11:58, 30 August 2017
Line 8:		Line 8:
	Spam bots took over as there was no adequate protection mechanisms for the Wiki, increasingly demotivating contributors while the admins seemed lethargic towards the problem. Out of frustration Eelco announced the "Lockdown" of the Wiki on the 29th of August 2016. On the 9th of February user copumpkin opened an issue with the [https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/issues/22599 Request to unlock the wiki], another epic discussion started with almost a hundred responses but no outcome how to proceed with the official Wiki.		Spam bots took over as there was no adequate protection mechanisms for the Wiki, increasingly demotivating contributors while the admins seemed lethargic towards the problem. Out of frustration Eelco announced the "Lockdown" of the Wiki on the 29th of August 2016. On the 9th of February user copumpkin opened an issue with the [https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/issues/22599 Request to unlock the wiki], another epic discussion started with almost a hundred responses but no outcome how to proceed with the official Wiki.

	On May 9th the Wiki was permanently disabled when a [https://github.com/NixOS/nixos-org-configurations/pull/30 PR by Graham Christensen] was merged by Eelco. People started referencing to the [https://web.archive.org/web/20160829180446/https://nixos.org/wiki/Main_Page Archive.org mirror of the Wiki].		On May 9th the Wiki was permanently disabled when a [https://github.com/NixOS/nixos-org-configurations/pull/30 PR by Graham Christensen] was merged by Eelco. People started referencing to the [https://web.archive.org/web/20160829180446/https://nixos.org/wiki/Main_Page Archive.org mirror of the Wiki]. The last export of the original wiki is mirrored at [https://web.archive.org/web/20170830114339/https://nixos.org/~eelco/wiki-20160212.xml.gz archive.org] announced [https://nixos.org/nix-dev/2016-February/019490.html on the mailing list].

	To fill the void in the community contributor Jörg Thalheim (Mic92) started the [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki/wiki nixos-users wiki] on April 24th. Since Nixpkgs is hosted on GitHub, he opted to use the GitHub native wiki, allowing everybody who needed access to directly edit the wiki. This instance is known as the "first unofficial" wiki. Only a very small number of selected wiki articles were transferred from the original wiki.		To fill the void in the community contributor Jörg Thalheim (Mic92) started the [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki/wiki nixos-users wiki] on April 24th. Since Nixpkgs is hosted on GitHub, he opted to use the GitHub native wiki, allowing everybody who needed access to directly edit the wiki. This instance is known as the "first unofficial" wiki. Only a very small number of selected wiki articles were transferred from the original wiki.

imported>Grahamc: Remove delete extra words.

2017-08-30T11:30:42Z

Remove delete extra words.

← Older revision		Revision as of 11:30, 30 August 2017
Line 8:		Line 8:
	Spam bots took over as there was no adequate protection mechanisms for the Wiki, increasingly demotivating contributors while the admins seemed lethargic towards the problem. Out of frustration Eelco announced the "Lockdown" of the Wiki on the 29th of August 2016. On the 9th of February user copumpkin opened an issue with the [https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/issues/22599 Request to unlock the wiki], another epic discussion started with almost a hundred responses but no outcome how to proceed with the official Wiki.		Spam bots took over as there was no adequate protection mechanisms for the Wiki, increasingly demotivating contributors while the admins seemed lethargic towards the problem. Out of frustration Eelco announced the "Lockdown" of the Wiki on the 29th of August 2016. On the 9th of February user copumpkin opened an issue with the [https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/issues/22599 Request to unlock the wiki], another epic discussion started with almost a hundred responses but no outcome how to proceed with the official Wiki.

	On May 9th the Wiki was permanently disabled when a [https://github.com/NixOS/nixos-org-configurations/pull/30 PR by Graham Christensen] ~~which~~ was merged by Eelco. People started referencing to the [https://web.archive.org/web/20160829180446/https://nixos.org/wiki/Main_Page Archive.org mirror of the Wiki].		On May 9th the Wiki was permanently disabled when a [https://github.com/NixOS/nixos-org-configurations/pull/30 PR by Graham Christensen] was merged by Eelco. People started referencing to the [https://web.archive.org/web/20160829180446/https://nixos.org/wiki/Main_Page Archive.org mirror of the Wiki].

	To fill the void in the community contributor Jörg Thalheim (Mic92) started the [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki/wiki nixos-users wiki] on April 24th. Since Nixpkgs is hosted on GitHub, he opted to use the GitHub native wiki, allowing everybody who needed access to directly edit the wiki. This instance is known as the "first unofficial" wiki. Only a very small number of selected wiki articles were transferred from the original wiki.		To fill the void in the community contributor Jörg Thalheim (Mic92) started the [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki/wiki nixos-users wiki] on April 24th. Since Nixpkgs is hosted on GitHub, he opted to use the GitHub native wiki, allowing everybody who needed access to directly edit the wiki. This instance is known as the "first unofficial" wiki. Only a very small number of selected wiki articles were transferred from the original wiki.

imported>Grahamc: Don't imply the PR was merged the same day it was created.

2017-08-30T11:30:02Z

Don't imply the PR was merged the same day it was created.

← Older revision		Revision as of 11:30, 30 August 2017
Line 8:		Line 8:
	Spam bots took over as there was no adequate protection mechanisms for the Wiki, increasingly demotivating contributors while the admins seemed lethargic towards the problem. Out of frustration Eelco announced the "Lockdown" of the Wiki on the 29th of August 2016. On the 9th of February user copumpkin opened an issue with the [https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/issues/22599 Request to unlock the wiki], another epic discussion started with almost a hundred responses but no outcome how to proceed with the official Wiki.		Spam bots took over as there was no adequate protection mechanisms for the Wiki, increasingly demotivating contributors while the admins seemed lethargic towards the problem. Out of frustration Eelco announced the "Lockdown" of the Wiki on the 29th of August 2016. On the 9th of February user copumpkin opened an issue with the [https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/issues/22599 Request to unlock the wiki], another epic discussion started with almost a hundred responses but no outcome how to proceed with the official Wiki.

	On May 9th the Wiki was permanently disabled ~~with~~ a [https://github.com/NixOS/nixos-org-configurations/pull/30 PR by Graham Christensen] which was merged ~~on the same day~~ by Eelco. People started referencing to the [https://web.archive.org/web/20160829180446/https://nixos.org/wiki/Main_Page Archive.org mirror of the Wiki].		On May 9th the Wiki was permanently disabled when a [https://github.com/NixOS/nixos-org-configurations/pull/30 PR by Graham Christensen] which was merged by Eelco. People started referencing to the [https://web.archive.org/web/20160829180446/https://nixos.org/wiki/Main_Page Archive.org mirror of the Wiki].

	To fill the void in the community contributor Jörg Thalheim (Mic92) started the [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki/wiki nixos-users wiki] on April 24th. Since Nixpkgs is hosted on GitHub, he opted to use the GitHub native wiki, allowing everybody who needed access to directly edit the wiki. This instance is known as the "first unofficial" wiki. Only a very small number of selected wiki articles were transferred from the original wiki.		To fill the void in the community contributor Jörg Thalheim (Mic92) started the [https://github.com/nixos-users/wiki/wiki nixos-users wiki] on April 24th. Since Nixpkgs is hosted on GitHub, he opted to use the GitHub native wiki, allowing everybody who needed access to directly edit the wiki. This instance is known as the "first unofficial" wiki. Only a very small number of selected wiki articles were transferred from the original wiki.