C

This is a collection of recipes for working on C/C++ projects with Nix. They do not just apply to C but also C++.

Differences between nixpkgs and the rest

The way nixpkgs and its stdenv handles compiling and linking is very different from other Linux distributions. In more conventional Linux distributions it's usual that header files are put into well known paths i.e. /usr/include, where the compiler will look for them. Same is true when linking against libraries, which are put in a few places, where the build-time linker will find them. Dynamically linked libraries will have a run-time linker (also known as ld.so) set as an interpreter. This linker reads /etc/ld.so.conf to figure out where to find libraries. In nixpkgs in contrast this information is provided by environment variables. Those will be set based on the build inputs that are given when building a package or when loading a nix expression into a nix-shell. Therefore it is not sufficient to just install libraries with nix-env into the profile since the compiler will not look in those paths when compiling.

The compiler wrapper

When inspecting the compiler or linker executable one will notice that those are not binaries but shell scripts:

$ nix-shell -p hello --command 'which $CC'
/nix/store/isg8rxaxkijl9x3hr2gzsf8pqfnqxg3k-gcc-wrapper-7.4.0/bin/gcc
$ nix-shell -p hello --command 'which $LD'
/nix/store/isg8rxaxkijl9x3hr2gzsf8pqfnqxg3k-gcc-wrapper-7.4.0/bin/ld
$ file /nix/store/isg8rxaxkijl9x3hr2gzsf8pqfnqxg3k-gcc-wrapper-7.4.0/bin/gcc /nix/store/isg8rxaxkijl9x3hr2gzsf8pqfnqxg3k-gcc-wrapper-7.4.0/bin/ld
/nix/store/isg8rxaxkijl9x3hr2gzsf8pqfnqxg3k-gcc-wrapper-7.4.0/bin/gcc: a /nix/store/vs6d2fjkl4kb3jb7rwibsd76k9v2n4xy-bash-4.4-p23/bin/bash script, ASCII text executable
/nix/store/isg8rxaxkijl9x3hr2gzsf8pqfnqxg3k-gcc-wrapper-7.4.0/bin/ld:  symbolic link to /nix/store/lwdkm354f3zzsvkf7pqmnc8w6r164b42-binutils-wrapper-2.30/bin/ld

These shell-scripts wrap around the actual compiler and add additional compiler flags depending on environment variables. In particular the wrapper around the C compiler, will also look for a NIX_CFLAGS_COMPILE variable and prepend the content to command line arguments passed to the underlying compiler. A different variable is called NIX_LDFLAGS, which will be provided as input to the build time linker. Nixpkgs use these variables to influence what kind of header files and libraries are visible to the build tools when running. For example when we add zlib to buildInputs of a stdenv.mkDerivation call and load the resulting file in a nix-shell, we can see the effect on both NIX_CFLAGS_COMPILE and NIX_LDFLAGS

$ cat > shell.nix <<EOF ;nix-shell
with import <nixpkgs> {};
stdenv.mkDerivation {
  name = "myenv";
  buildInputs = [ zlib ];
}
EOF
[nix-shell:~] $ echo $NIX_CFLAGS_COMPILE
-isystem /nix/store/bjl5kk674rmdzzpmcsvmw73hvf35jwh8-zlib-1.2.11-dev/include -isystem /nix/store/bjl5kk674rmdzzpmcsvmw73hvf35jwh8-zlib-1.2.11-dev/include
[nix-shell:~] $ echo $NIX_LDFLAGS
-rpath /nix/store/d5dzr90q2wy2nlw0z7s0pgxkjfjv1jrj-myenv/lib64 -rpath /nix/store/d5dzr90q2wy2nlw0z7s0pgxkjfjv1jrj-myenv/lib -L/nix/store/5dphwv1xs46n0qbhynny2lbhmx4xh1fc-zlib-1.2.11/lib -L/nix/store/5dphwv1xs46n0qbhynny2lbhmx4xh1fc-zlib-1.2.11/lib

In $NIX_CFLAGS_COMPILE we see that the include search path is extended by appending new directories using the -isystem flag.

However, while the $out/include folder will be included by default, it may sometimes not be enough when the lib puts the header in a subfolder (for instance, gtk2 and gtk3 uses subdirectories like $out/include/gtk-2.0 instead to avoid conflict between versions). To deal with this kind of libraries, one can use `pkg-config`: the idea is simply to add `pkg-config` in the nativeBuildInputs, and then to start the buildPhase with:

buildPhase = ''
  NIX_CFLAGS_COMPILE="$(pkg-config --cflags gtk+-3.0) $NIX_CFLAGS_COMPILE"
  # put the usual make/gcc code here
'';

For $NIX_LDFLAGS see that the library link path is extended using the -L flag. We also notice that in addition to library paths the linker gets instructed to extend the RPATH of the program using the -rpath flag. This is needed when the executable is executed since the runtime linker will read the RPATH from the elf header to figure out where to find shared libraries. We can print the RPATH of executable using the patchelf command.

$ nix-shell -p hello --command 'patchelf --print-rpath $(which hello)'
/nix/store/fivq0nbggp4y8mhy3ixprqd7qyn1hy2j-glibc-2.27/lib

Debugging the compiler wrapper

To inspect how the shell wrapper processes the variables one can set the NIX_DEBUG environment variable:

$ nix-shell -p hello --command 'NIX_DEBUG=1 $CC -v'
HARDENING: disabled flags: pie
HARDENING: Is active (not completely disabled with "all" flag)
HARDENING: enabling fortify
HARDENING: enabling stackprotector
HARDENING: enabling strictoverflow
HARDENING: enabling format
HARDENING: enabling pic
extra flags before to /nix/store/4ga86h16l157r7bas9hcwxgl9d3r32s6-gcc-7.4.0/bin/gcc:
  ''
original flags to /nix/store/4ga86h16l157r7bas9hcwxgl9d3r32s6-gcc-7.4.0/bin/gcc:
  -v
extra flags after to /nix/store/4ga86h16l157r7bas9hcwxgl9d3r32s6-gcc-7.4.0/bin/gcc:
  ''
Using built-in specs.
COLLECT_GCC=/nix/store/4ga86h16l157r7bas9hcwxgl9d3r32s6-gcc-7.4.0/bin/gcc
COLLECT_LTO_WRAPPER=/nix/store/4ga86h16l157r7bas9hcwxgl9d3r32s6-gcc-7.4.0/libexec/gcc/x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu/7.4.0/lto-wrapper
Target: x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu
Configured with:
Thread model: posix
gcc version 7.4.0 (GCC)

Hardening flags

To improve the security of applications the wrapper also injects additional hardening compile flags into the application. These nix flags enable different compiler flags, as seen in the manual. Under some circumstances this can make programs fail to build or function. For example, the `fortify` flag enables the `-O2` optimization level -- if you want to change this, you need to disable the `fortify` flag and re-add the compiler flags manually (`env.NIX_CFLAGS_COMPILE = [ "-O" "....."]`). To disable all hardening options one can export the environment variable hardeningDisable="all". This also works for derivations like that:

with import <nixpkgs> {};
stdenv.mkDerivation {
  hardeningDisable = [ "all" ];
};

It is also possible to only disable certain parts, for example -Werror=format-security:

with import <nixpkgs> {};
stdenv.mkDerivation {
  hardeningDisable = [ "format" ];
};

Further options are described in the manual

pkg-config

pkg-config is a tool and file format to describe what compiler and linker flags a build process needs to add to use a certain library. It is often used as part of the build process to check if needed dependencies are present and in the right version. In nix expression pkg-config will find its .pc files by looking up the PKG_CONFIG_PATH variable. This variable is automatically set when pkg-config is present in nativeBuildInputs by a build-support hook provided by the pkg-config package.

If you save the following file as shell.nix:

with import <nixpkgs> {};
stdenv.mkDerivation {
  name = "env";
  nativeBuildInputs = [ pkg-config ];
  buildInputs = [
    cryptsetup
  ];
}

The PKG_CONFIG_PATH variable will have the following content when running nix-shell

[nix-shell:~]  $ echo $PKG_CONFIG_PATH
/nix/store/ypg1r7c8m0rkim7by4ikn68xc88bi53j-cryptsetup-2.0.6-dev/lib/pkgconfig:/nix/store/ypg1r7c8m0rkim7by4ikn68xc88bi53j-cryptsetup-2.0.6-dev/lib/pkgconfig
[nix-shell:~] $ pkg-config --cflags libcryptsetup
-I/nix/store/ypg1r7c8m0rkim7by4ikn68xc88bi53j-cryptsetup-2.0.6-dev/include

When using autoconf, pkg-config is a required build input for providing the AC_CHECK_HEADERS m4 macro.

pkg-config package names

To list all pkg-config package names of a Nix package:

$ nix-shell -p pkgconfig libglvnd
$ pkg-config --list-all 
egl       egl - EGL library and headers
libglvnd  libglvnd - Vendor-neutral OpenGL dispatch library vendor interface
glx       glx - GLX library and headers
glesv1_cm glesv1_cm - OpenGL ES-CM v1 library and headers
opengl    opengl - OpenGL (without GLX) headers and interface
glesv2    gles2 - OpenGL ES v2/v3 library and headers
gl        gl - Legacy OpenGL and GLX library and headers

cmake

Similar to pkg-config cmake relies on the $CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH to finds its modules (files ending in .cmake). Also see this example:

with import <nixpkgs> {};
stdenv.mkDerivation {
  name = "env";
  nativeBuildInputs = [ cmake ];
  buildInputs = [ zeromq ];
}

$ nix-shell
[nix-shell:~] $ echo $CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH
/nix/store/lw4xr0x2p6xyfgbk961lxh8vnnx7vn2r-cmake-3.12.1:/nix/store/j4x44bjjgwy7hm7lazj8xnr9mnlfiksh-patchelf-0.9:/nix/store/isg8rxaxkijl9x3hr2gzsf8pqfnqxg3k-gcc-wrapper-7.4.0:/nix/store/lwdkm354f3zzsvkf7pqmnc8w6r164b42-binutils-wrapper-2.30:/nix/store/biz7v9g4g6yrnp2h8wfn01d6pk3bj2m1-zeromq-4.3.0:/nix/store/lw4xr0x2p6xyfgbk961lxh8vnnx7vn2r-cmake-3.12.1:/nix/store/j4x44bjjgwy7hm7lazj8xnr9mnlfiksh-patchelf-0.9:/nix/store/isg8rxaxkijl9x3hr2gzsf8pqfnqxg3k-gcc-wrapper-7.4.0:/nix/store/lwdkm354f3zzsvkf7pqmnc8w6r164b42-binutils-wrapper-2.30:/nix/store/biz7v9g4g6yrnp2h8wfn01d6pk3bj2m1-zeromq-4.3.0
[nix-shell:~] $ cat >CMakeLists.txt <<EOF
cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 2.8)
project(helloworld)
add_executable(helloworld hello.c)
find_package (ZeroMQ)
EOF
[nix-shell:~] $ echo 'int main {}' > hello.c
[nix-shell:~] $ cmake .

gcc multilib

pkgs.gcc_multi exports a gcc in a multilib variant, which can produce 32-bit and 64-bit x86 code at the same time. However, gcc_multi falls back to the gcc version coming from pkgs.gcc. To use a specific version of gcc, you might use something like that:

{
  gcc11_multi = pkgs.wrapCCMulti pkgs.gcc11;
  // or
  gcc13_multi = pkgs.wrapCCMulti pkgs.gcc13;
}

Cross-Compiling

To get access to a cross-compiling toolchain use pkgsCross prefix. In this example we load the compiler for the arm-embedded target (bare metal without operating system):

with import <nixpkgs> {};
pkgsCross.arm-embedded.stdenv.mkDerivation {
  name = "env";
}

This will set build environment variables like $CC, $AR and $LD:

$ echo $CC $AR $CXX $LD
arm-none-eabi-gcc arm-none-eabi-ar arm-none-eabi-g++ arm-none-eabi-ld

Well behaved build systems should respect these environment variables when building projects. Also take a look in the Cross Compiling article for further information on cross-compiling.

Debug symbols

Editor/IDE integration

Tooling that provides autocompletion or refactoring support also needs to be aware of the environments variables to find C/C++ header files. Nixpkgs adds wrapper to all language server clangd (recommend), ccls and cquery to extend the include path of these tools. CCLS also provides extensive documentation on how to setup a project/editors to make use of it.

Use a different compiler version

Adding a different c compiler to buildInputs in a nix expression will not change the default compiler available in $PATH. Instead, nixpkgs provides a several alternative stdenv which you can search with nix search stdenv so for example:

gcc8Stdenv.mkDerivation {
  name = "env";
}

$ nix-shell --command 'gcc --version'
gcc (GCC) 8.3.0

Available gcc based stdenv variants: gcc{49,6-12}Stdenv, gccMultiStdenv (32bit/64bit mixed support)
Available clang based stdenv variants: llvmPackages_[5-13].{stdenv,libcxxStdenv}, clangMultiStdenv (32bit/64bit mixed support)

Those stdenv instances can be also constructed using the overrideCC function: Here we are creating a shell environment that will always have the latest available gcc:

(overrideCC stdenv gcc_latest).mkDerivation {
  name = "env";
}

Note that this will only affect compiler and not the used linker. To overwrite the linker and maybe also the used libc Check out the wrapCCWith example in the next section.

Get a compiler without default libc

By default cc wrapper will include the libc headers (i.e. glibc). This can break for example projects that would bring their own libc (i.e. musl). However it is possible to get a cc wrapper that would include all build inputs without adding glibc:

let
  gcc_nolibc = wrapCCWith {
    cc = gcc.cc;
    bintools = wrapBintoolsWith {
      bintools = binutils-unwrapped;
      libc = null;
    };
  };
in (overrideCC stdenv gcc_nolibc).mkDerivation {
  name = "env";
}

Override binutils

This example shows how to apply changes to the binutils package and than use the override binutils package to compose a new stdenv.

with import <nixpkgs> {};
let
  binutils-unwrapped' = binutils-unwrapped.overrideAttrs (old: {
    name = "binutils-2.37";
    src = pkgs.fetchurl {
      url = "https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/binutils/binutils-2.37.tar.xz";
      sha256 = "sha256-gg2XJPAgo+acszeJOgtjwtsWHa3LDgb8Edwp6x6Eoyw=";
    };
    patches = [];
  });
  cc = wrapCCWith rec {
    cc = gcc-unwrapped;
    bintools = wrapBintoolsWith {
      bintools = binutils-unwrapped';
      libc = glibc;
    };
  };
in
(overrideCC stdenv cc).mkDerivation {
  name = "env";
}

Faster GCC compiler

The default gcc compiler in nixpkgs disables profile-guided optimization in order to achieve deterministic builds. There is a faster version available in nixpkgs via the fastStdenv attribute (7-12% faster).

fastStdenv.mkDerivation {
   name = "env";
}

Use a clang compiled from source

Unwrapped compilers usually do not have any access to libraries/headers in nix. This is an issue if you work on the clang/llvm code base. Assuming you have built llvm/clang like this

$  git clone https://github.com/llvm/llvm-project
$ cd llvm-project
$ nix-shell -p cmake --command 'mkdir build &&  cd build && cmake -DLLVM_ENABLE_PROJECTS="clang;clang-tools-extra" -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=../install -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug ../llvm && make -j$(nproc)'

You can create a wrapper around your local build binaries like this:

# This file assumes that your llvm binaries are stored in ./build/bin
# impure-clang.nix
{ stdenv, wrapCC, runtimeShell }:                                                                 
wrapCC (stdenv.mkDerivation {                                                                     
  name = "impure-clang";                                                                          
  dontUnpack = true;                                                                              
  installPhase = ''                                                                               
    mkdir -p $out/bin                                                                             
    for bin in ${toString (builtins.attrNames (builtins.readDir ./build/bin))}; do   
      cat > $out/bin/$bin <<EOF                                                                   
#!${runtimeShell}                                                                                 
exec "${toString ./.}/build/bin/$bin" "\$@"                                          
EOF                                                                                               
      chmod +x $out/bin/$bin                                                                      
    done                                                                                          
  '';                                                                                             
  passthru.isClang = true;                                                                        
})

Then you can create a shell.nix like this:

 with import <nixpkgs> {};
 pkgs.mkShell {
   nativeBuildInputs = [
    cmake
    (callPackage ./impure-clang.nix {})
   ];
 }

And use your self-compiled clang in a nix-shell:

$ nix-shell --command 'clang --version'

Further information

Nix Friday about C/CPP infrastructure in Nix