doc: Document config.allowUnsupportedSystem and its env var

This commit is contained in:
John Ericson 2018-04-17 16:08:21 -04:00
parent cb212cf549
commit c66440c104

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@ -14,6 +14,8 @@ true:</para>
its <literal>meta.broken</literal> set to
<literal>true</literal>.</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>The package isn't intended to run on the given system, as none of its <literal>meta.platforms</literal> match the given system.</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>The package's <literal>meta.license</literal> is set
to a license which is considered to be unfree.</para></listitem>
@ -88,6 +90,42 @@ distributing the software.</para>
</itemizedlist>
</section>
<section xml:id="sec-allow-unsupported-system">
<title>Installing packages on unsupported systems</title>
<para>
There are also two ways to try compiling a package which has been marked as unsuported for the given system.
</para>
<itemizedlist>
<listitem><para>
For allowing the build of a broken package once, you can use an environment variable for a single invocation of the nix tools:
<programlisting>$ export NIXPKGS_ALLOW_UNSUPPORTED_SYSTEM=1</programlisting>
</para></listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
For permanently allowing broken packages to be built, you may add <literal>allowUnsupportedSystem = true;</literal> to your user's configuration file, like this:
<programlisting>
{
allowUnsupportedSystem = true;
}
</programlisting>
</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
<para>
The difference between an a package being unsupported on some system and being broken is admittedly a bit fuzzy.
If a program <emphasis>ought</emphasis> to work on a certain platform, but doesn't, the platform should be included in <literal>meta.platforms</literal>, but marked as broken with e.g. <literal>meta.broken = !hostPlatform.isWindows</literal>.
Of course, this begs the question of what "ought" means exactly.
That is left to the package maintainer.
</para>
</section>
<section xml:id="sec-allow-unfree">
<title>Installing unfree packages</title>
@ -397,7 +435,7 @@ fi
</para>
</section>
<section xml:id="sec-gnu-info-setup">
<title>GNU info setup</title>