In Nix, there’s often some confusion between NixOS, Nixlang, Nixpkgs and Nix-the-package-manager. It seems that “Nix” is a heavily overloaded term.
Could we find different names for these in Aux?
16 Likes
YES PLEASE.
I think we should be deliberate when choosing names for the many pieces that make up the ecosystem. There are lots of options so I would like to hear from others what ideas they may have. We have a blank canvas right now to work with, let’s throw some ideas at the wall!
6 Likes
Perhaps an obvious option would be similar naming to Nix, but with a bit more consistency:
- Aux CLI
- Aux Packages
- Aux Language
- …
2 Likes
i propose “Aux Ports” : )
2 Likes
We have a bit of a joke going on in the Linux Gaming discord where we’re all repping “AuxOS” roles at the moment to show support 
1 Like
Is the plan to keep using the Nix language long term? If not, should we create a new language or pick an existing one?
We will be keeping the language for the foreseeable future. Any changes on that front would be much farther down the road.
3 Likes
I think creating a whole new language to replace nix would be a herculean effort at the very least at this stage of aux. 
3 Likes
Hmmm, I think this works if there’s nothing called Aux. Unfortunately, if you have aux-the-language, you probably want to have it in .aux files and say “I’m writing some Aux today”, and this might create some of the same confusion.
I don’t know if you can be so strict with your names except by picking things that aren’t all AuxX… although maybe that doesn’t matter so much if nothing is “officially” called Aux because then there is always a name to fall back to if you need to be specific.
9 Likes
The most important thing to me is not to allow confusion between nix the DSL and cppnix but of course towards aux.
3 Likes
I’d hope for this to follow the roadmap where step 2 starts naming things differently. This would coincide with the introduction of more diverging changes. I don’t think that Aux would be wholly different from Nix, but it might be nice not to add more things to their name.
1 Like
I see where you’re coming from, and I definitely agree that this is something worth considering.
Yeah, we will want to figure out naming for phase 2. The first phase will be as simple as literally having “nixpkgs” and “nix” repositories. Once we’re confident in maintaining those and switching to hard forking then we can take ownership.
10 Likes
I agree (with “not creating a new language”) - and there’s already Guix. Part of the attraction of aux, as an “end user”, is the prospect of not having to rewrite all my stuff.
Maybe in a few years time things will look different but for now, staying nix-compatible will be pivotal for mindshare
7 Likes
From the original announcement some of the major goals we (the users) had for aux was to maintain backwards compatibility with nix and nixpkgs at least for the foreseeable future. So I would say this is high up on our priorities list.
7 Likes
.aux file extension already exists, so that is sadly not a option 
What if we did something terrible…
5 Likes
Maybe we could use .ux?
.auc (aux.computer) and we could still additionally support .nix file extension too. (@jakehamilton, I am pleeb from vimjoyers discord server)
5 Likes
We should definitely do .notnix (/j)
2 Likes