First, we need check against the host platform, not the build platform.
That's simple enough.
Second, we move away from exahustive finite case analysis (i.e.
exhaustively listing all platforms the package builds on). That only
work in a closed-world setting, where we know all platforms we might
build one. But with cross compilation, we may be building for arbitrary
platforms, So we need fancier filters. This is the closed world to open
world change.
The solution is instead of having a list of systems (strings in the form
"foo-bar"), we have a list of of systems or "patterns", i.e. attributes
that partially match the output of the parsers in `lib.systems.parse`.
The "check meta" logic treats the systems strings as an exact whitelist
just as before, but treats the patterns as a fuzzy whitelist,
intersecting the actual `hostPlatform` with the pattern and then
checking for equality. (This is done using `matchAttrs`).
The default convenience lists for `meta.platforms` are now changed to be
lists of patterns (usually a single pattern) in
`lib/systems/for-meta.nix` for maximum flexibility under this new
system.
Fixes#30902
This pushes check-meta evaluation to derivation evaluation step, leaving all other
attributes accessible.
Before this commit:
> $ HOME=/homeless-shelter NIX_PATH=nixpkgs=$(pwd) nix-instantiate --eval --strict ./default.nix -A xen --argstr system aarch64-linux
> Package ‘xen-4.5.5’ in pkgs/applications/virtualization/xen/generic.nix:226 is not supported on ‘aarch64-linux’, refusing to evaluate.
as expected
> $ HOME=/homeless-shelter NIX_PATH=nixpkgs=$(pwd) nix-instantiate --eval --strict ./default.nix -A xen.name --argstr system aarch64-linux
> Package ‘xen-4.5.5’ in pkgs/applications/virtualization/xen/generic.nix:226 is not supported on ‘aarch64-linux’, refusing to evaluate.
> $ HOME=/homeless-shelter NIX_PATH=nixpkgs=$(pwd) nix-instantiate --eval --strict ./default.nix -A xen.meta.description --argstr system aarch64-linux
> Package ‘xen-4.5.5’ in pkgs/applications/virtualization/xen/generic.nix:226 is not supported on ‘aarch64-linux’, refusing to evaluate.
which is unfortunate since its impossible to use packages in autogenerated
documentation on all platforms.
After this commit:
> $ HOME=/homeless-shelter NIX_PATH=nixpkgs=$(pwd) nix-instantiate --eval --strict ./default.nix -A xen --argstr system aarch64-linux
still fails
> $ HOME=/homeless-shelter NIX_PATH=nixpkgs=$(pwd) nix-instantiate --eval --strict ./default.nix -A xen.name --argstr system aarch64-linux
> "xen-4.5.5"
> $ HOME=/homeless-shelter NIX_PATH=nixpkgs=$(pwd) nix-instantiate --eval --strict ./default.nix -A xen.meta.description --argstr system aarch64-linux
> "Xen hypervisor and related components (vanilla)"
- tracing seems annoying enough
- we get errors for all packages instead of aborting on the first one
- easier to differentiate from unwanted packages (broken, unfree, etc.)
Currently the logic of generating nixpkgs Hydra jobs is to walk through
the pkgs evaluated for system = "x86_64-linux", collect any derivations
and their meta.platforms values. However, that doesn't work for
packages whose meta.platforms doesn't include x86_64-linux, as just
evaluating their meta attribute raises an error so they get skipped
completely.
As a less-intrusive fix (i.e. anything than rewriting the current package
enumeration logic), allow passing `config.allowUnsupportedSystem = true`
to permit evaluating packages regardless of their platform and use that
in the package listing phase.
Fixes#25200
Only cosmetic changes are done otherwise.
Real refactoring is left for later.
There's a small slow-down on my machine:
$ time nix-env -qa -P >/dev/null
gets from ~2.8 to ~3.5 seconds (negligible change in RAM).
That's most likely caused by sharing less computation between different
mkDerivation calls, and I plan to improve that soon.
