Pidgin

Pidgin is a multi-protocol messaging client.

Pidgin is available in NixOS, as are many popular plugins such as pidgin-otr.

Installing plugins

NixOS provides Pidgin plugins as packages such as pidginotr, but installing them via nix-env or environment.systemPackages will not work. The plugin packages must be configured as part of the pidgin-with-plugins package via a package override.

User-scope installation

To install Pidgin with desired plugins only for the current user:

1. In ~/.config/nixpkgs/config.nix, add:

   {
     ...
     packageOverrides = pkgs: rec {
       pidgin-with-plugins = pkgs.pidgin.override {
         ## Add whatever plugins are desired (see nixos.org package listing).
         plugins = [ pkgs.pidgin-otr ];
       };
     };
     ...
   }
   

2. Install pidgin with nix-env -iA nixos.pidgin-with-plugins

System-scope installation

To install Pidgin with desired plugins for all users on the system:

1. Amend /etc/nixos/configuration.nix to add pidgin-with-plugins to systemPackages:

   {
     ...
     environment.systemPackages = with pkgs; [
       pidgin-with-plugins
     ];
     ...
   }
   

2. Override pidgin-with-plugins to add the desired plugins:

   {
     ...
     nixpkgs.config = {
       allowUnfree = true;
       packageOverrides = pkgs: with pkgs; {
         pidgin-with-plugins = pkgs.pidgin.override {
           ## Add whatever plugins are desired (see nixos.org package listing).
           plugins = [ pidgin-otr ];
         };
       };
     };
     ...
   }
   

3. Run nixos-rebuild switch as root to apply changes.