Built-ins

This section lists the values and functions built into the Nix language evaluator. All built-ins are available through the global builtins constant.

Some built-ins are also exposed directly in the global scope:

derivation attrs

derivation is described in its own section.

abort s

Abort Nix expression evaluation and print the error message s.

add e1 e2

Return the sum of the numbers e1 and e2.

addDrvOutputDependencies s

Create a copy of the given string where a single constant string context element is turned into a derivation deep string context element.

The store path that is the constant string context element should point to a valid derivation, and end in .drv.

The original string context element must not be empty or have multiple elements, and it must not have any other type of element other than a constant or derivation deep element. The latter is supported so this function is idempotent.

This is the opposite of builtins.unsafeDiscardOutputDependency.

all pred list

Return true if the function pred returns true for all elements of list, and false otherwise.

any pred list

Return true if the function pred returns true for at least one element of list, and false otherwise.

attrNames set

Return the names of the attributes in the set set in an alphabetically sorted list. For instance, builtins.attrNames { y = 1; x = "foo"; } evaluates to [ "x" "y" ].

attrValues set

Return the values of the attributes in the set set in the order corresponding to the sorted attribute names.

baseNameOf x

Return the base name of either a path value x or a string x, depending on which type is passed, and according to the following rules.

For a path value, the base name is considered to be the part of the path after the last directory separator, including any file extensions. This is the simple case, as path values don't have trailing slashes.

When the argument is a string, a more involved logic applies. If the string ends with a /, only this one final slash is removed.

After this, the base name is returned as previously described, assuming / as the directory separator. (Note that evaluation must be platform independent.)

This is somewhat similar to the GNU basename command, but GNU basename will strip any number of trailing slashes.

bitAnd e1 e2

Return the bitwise AND of the integers e1 and e2.

bitOr e1 e2

Return the bitwise OR of the integers e1 and e2.

bitXor e1 e2

Return the bitwise XOR of the integers e1 and e2.

break v

In debug mode (enabled using --debugger), pause Nix expression evaluation and enter the REPL. Otherwise, return the argument v.

builtins (set)

Contains all the built-in functions and values.

Since built-in functions were added over time, testing for attributes in builtins can be used for graceful fallback on older Nix installations:

# if hasContext is not available, we assume `s` has a context
if builtins ? hasContext then builtins.hasContext s else true
catAttrs attr list

Collect each attribute named attr from a list of attribute sets. Attrsets that don't contain the named attribute are ignored. For example,

builtins.catAttrs "a" [{a = 1;} {b = 0;} {a = 2;}]

evaluates to [1 2].

ceil double

Converts an IEEE-754 double-precision floating-point number (double) to the next higher integer.

If the datatype is neither an integer nor a "float", an evaluation error will be thrown.

compareVersions s1 s2

Compare two strings representing versions and return -1 if version s1 is older than version s2, 0 if they are the same, and 1 if s1 is newer than s2. The version comparison algorithm is the same as the one used by nix-env -u.

concatLists lists

Concatenate a list of lists into a single list.

concatMap f list

This function is equivalent to builtins.concatLists (map f list) but is more efficient.

concatStringsSep separator list

Concatenate a list of strings with a separator between each element, e.g. concatStringsSep "/" ["usr" "local" "bin"] == "usr/local/bin".

convertHash args

Return the specified representation of a hash string, based on the attributes presented in args:

  • hash

    The hash to be converted. The hash format is detected automatically.

  • hashAlgo

    The algorithm used to create the hash. Must be one of

    • "md5"
    • "sha1"
    • "sha256"
    • "sha512"

    The attribute may be omitted when hash is an SRI hash or when the hash is prefixed with the hash algorithm name followed by a colon. That <hashAlgo>:<hashBody> syntax is supported for backwards compatibility with existing tooling.

  • toHashFormat

    The format of the resulting hash. Must be one of

    • "base16"
    • "nix32"
    • "base32" (deprecated alias for "nix32")
    • "base64"
    • "sri"

The result hash is the toHashFormat representation of the hash hash.

Example

Convert a SHA256 hash in Base16 to SRI:

builtins.convertHash {
  hash = "e3b0c44298fc1c149afbf4c8996fb92427ae41e4649b934ca495991b7852b855";
  toHashFormat = "sri";
  hashAlgo = "sha256";
}

"sha256-47DEQpj8HBSa+/TImW+5JCeuQeRkm5NMpJWZG3hSuFU="

Example

Convert a SHA256 hash in SRI to Base16:

builtins.convertHash {
  hash = "sha256-47DEQpj8HBSa+/TImW+5JCeuQeRkm5NMpJWZG3hSuFU=";
  toHashFormat = "base16";
}

"e3b0c44298fc1c149afbf4c8996fb92427ae41e4649b934ca495991b7852b855"

Example

Convert a hash in the form <hashAlgo>:<hashBody> in Base16 to SRI:

builtins.convertHash {
  hash = "sha256:e3b0c44298fc1c149afbf4c8996fb92427ae41e4649b934ca495991b7852b855";
  toHashFormat = "sri";
}

"sha256-47DEQpj8HBSa+/TImW+5JCeuQeRkm5NMpJWZG3hSuFU="
currentSystem (string)

The value of the eval-system or else system configuration option.

It can be used to set the system attribute for builtins.derivation such that the resulting derivation can be built on the same system that evaluates the Nix expression:

 builtins.derivation {
   # ...
   system = builtins.currentSystem;
}

It can be overridden in order to create derivations for different system than the current one:

$ nix-instantiate --system "mips64-linux" --eval --expr 'builtins.currentSystem'
"mips64-linux"

Note

Not available in pure evaluation mode.

currentTime (integer)

Return the Unix time at first evaluation. Repeated references to that name will re-use the initially obtained value.

Example:

$ nix repl
Welcome to Nix 2.15.1 Type :? for help.

nix-repl> builtins.currentTime
1683705525

nix-repl> builtins.currentTime
1683705525

The store path of a derivation depending on currentTime will differ for each evaluation, unless both evaluate builtins.currentTime in the same second.

Note

Not available in pure evaluation mode.

deepSeq e1 e2

This is like seq e1 e2, except that e1 is evaluated deeply: if it’s a list or set, its elements or attributes are also evaluated recursively.

dirOf s

Return the directory part of the string s, that is, everything before the final slash in the string. This is similar to the GNU dirname command.

div e1 e2

Return the quotient of the numbers e1 and e2.

elem x xs

Return true if a value equal to x occurs in the list xs, and false otherwise.

elemAt xs n

Return element n from the list xs. Elements are counted starting from 0. A fatal error occurs if the index is out of bounds.

false (Boolean)

Primitive value.

It can be returned by comparison operators and used in conditional expressions.

The name false is not special, and can be shadowed:

nix-repl> let false = 1; in false
1
fetchClosure args

Note

This function is only available if the fetch-closure experimental feature is enabled.

For example, include the following in nix.conf:

extra-experimental-features = fetch-closure

Fetch a store path closure from a binary cache, and return the store path as a string with context.

This function can be invoked in three ways, that we will discuss in order of preference.

Fetch a content-addressed store path

Example:

builtins.fetchClosure {
  fromStore = "https://cache.nixos.org";
  fromPath = /nix/store/ldbhlwhh39wha58rm61bkiiwm6j7211j-git-2.33.1;
}

This is the simplest invocation, and it does not require the user of the expression to configure trusted-public-keys to ensure their authenticity.

If your store path is input addressed instead of content addressed, consider the other two invocations.

Fetch any store path and rewrite it to a fully content-addressed store path

Example:

builtins.fetchClosure {
  fromStore = "https://cache.nixos.org";
  fromPath = /nix/store/r2jd6ygnmirm2g803mksqqjm4y39yi6i-git-2.33.1;
  toPath = /nix/store/ldbhlwhh39wha58rm61bkiiwm6j7211j-git-2.33.1;
}

This example fetches /nix/store/r2jd... from the specified binary cache, and rewrites it into the content-addressed store path /nix/store/ldbh....

Like the previous example, no extra configuration or privileges are required.

To find out the correct value for toPath given a fromPath, use nix store make-content-addressed:

# nix store make-content-addressed --from https://cache.nixos.org /nix/store/r2jd6ygnmirm2g803mksqqjm4y39yi6i-git-2.33.1
rewrote '/nix/store/r2jd6ygnmirm2g803mksqqjm4y39yi6i-git-2.33.1' to '/nix/store/ldbhlwhh39wha58rm61bkiiwm6j7211j-git-2.33.1'

Alternatively, set toPath = "" and find the correct toPath in the error message.

Fetch an input-addressed store path as is

Example:

builtins.fetchClosure {
  fromStore = "https://cache.nixos.org";
  fromPath = /nix/store/r2jd6ygnmirm2g803mksqqjm4y39yi6i-git-2.33.1;
  inputAddressed = true;
}

It is possible to fetch an input-addressed store path and return it as is. However, this is the least preferred way of invoking fetchClosure, because it requires that the input-addressed paths are trusted by the Nix configuration.

builtins.storePath

fetchClosure is similar to builtins.storePath in that it allows you to use a previously built store path in a Nix expression. However, fetchClosure is more reproducible because it specifies a binary cache from which the path can be fetched. Also, using content-addressed store paths does not require users to configure trusted-public-keys to ensure their authenticity.

fetchGit args

Fetch a path from git. args can be a URL, in which case the HEAD of the repo at that URL is fetched. Otherwise, it can be an attribute with the following attributes (all except url optional):

  • url

    The URL of the repo.

  • name (default: source)

    The name of the directory the repo should be exported to in the store.

  • rev (default: the tip of ref)

    The Git revision to fetch. This is typically a commit hash.

  • ref (default: HEAD)

    The Git reference under which to look for the requested revision. This is often a branch or tag name.

    This option has no effect once shallow cloning is enabled.

    By default, the ref value is prefixed with refs/heads/. As of 2.3.0, Nix will not prefix refs/heads/ if ref starts with refs/.

  • submodules (default: false)

    A Boolean parameter that specifies whether submodules should be checked out.

  • exportIgnore (default: true)

    A Boolean parameter that specifies whether export-ignore from .gitattributes should be applied. This approximates part of the git archive behavior.

    Enabling this option is not recommended because it is unknown whether the Git developers commit to the reproducibility of export-ignore in newer Git versions.

  • shallow (default: false)

    Make a shallow clone when fetching the Git tree. When this is enabled, the options ref and allRefs have no effect anymore.

  • allRefs

    Whether to fetch all references (eg. branches and tags) of the repository. With this argument being true, it's possible to load a rev from any ref. (by default only revs from the specified ref are supported).

    This option has no effect once shallow cloning is enabled.

  • verifyCommit (default: true if publicKey or publicKeys are provided, otherwise false)

    Whether to check rev for a signature matching publicKey or publicKeys. If verifyCommit is enabled, then fetchGit cannot use a local repository with uncommitted changes. Requires the verified-fetches experimental feature.

  • publicKey

    The public key against which rev is verified if verifyCommit is enabled. Requires the verified-fetches experimental feature.

  • keytype (default: "ssh-ed25519")

    The key type of publicKey. Possible values:

  • publicKeys

    The public keys against which rev is verified if verifyCommit is enabled. Must be given as a list of attribute sets with the following form:

    {
  key = "<public key>";
  type = "<key type>"; # optional, default: "ssh-ed25519"
}

    Requires the verified-fetches experimental feature.

Here are some examples of how to use fetchGit.

  • To fetch a private repository over SSH:

    builtins.fetchGit {
  url = "git@github.com:my-secret/repository.git";
  ref = "master";
  rev = "adab8b916a45068c044658c4158d81878f9ed1c3";
}

  • To fetch an arbitrary reference:

    builtins.fetchGit {
  url = "https://github.com/NixOS/nix.git";
  ref = "refs/heads/0.5-release";
}

  • If the revision you're looking for is in the default branch of the git repository you don't strictly need to specify the branch name in the ref attribute.

    However, if the revision you're looking for is in a future branch for the non-default branch you will need to specify the the ref attribute as well.

    builtins.fetchGit {
  url = "https://github.com/nixos/nix.git";
  rev = "841fcbd04755c7a2865c51c1e2d3b045976b7452";
  ref = "1.11-maintenance";
}

    Note

    It is nice to always specify the branch which a revision belongs to. Without the branch being specified, the fetcher might fail if the default branch changes. Additionally, it can be confusing to try a commit from a non-default branch and see the fetch fail. If the branch is specified the fault is much more obvious.

  • If the revision you're looking for is in the default branch of the git repository you may omit the ref attribute.

    builtins.fetchGit {
  url = "https://github.com/nixos/nix.git";
  rev = "841fcbd04755c7a2865c51c1e2d3b045976b7452";
}

  • To fetch a specific tag:

    builtins.fetchGit {
  url = "https://github.com/nixos/nix.git";
  ref = "refs/tags/1.9";
}

  • To fetch the latest version of a remote branch:

    builtins.fetchGit {
  url = "ssh://git@github.com/nixos/nix.git";
  ref = "master";
}

  • To verify the commit signature:

    builtins.fetchGit {
  url = "ssh://git@github.com/nixos/nix.git";
  verifyCommit = true;
  publicKeys = [
      {
        type = "ssh-ed25519";
        key = "AAAAC3NzaC1lZDI1NTE5AAAAIArPKULJOid8eS6XETwUjO48/HKBWl7FTCK0Z//fplDi";
      }
  ];
}

    Nix will refetch the branch according to the tarball-ttl setting.

    This behavior is disabled in pure evaluation mode.

  • To fetch the content of a checked-out work directory:

    builtins.fetchGit ./work-dir

If the URL points to a local directory, and no ref or rev is given, fetchGit will use the current content of the checked-out files, even if they are not committed or added to Git's index. It will only consider files added to the Git repository, as listed by git ls-files.

fetchTarball args

Download the specified URL, unpack it and return the path of the unpacked tree. The file must be a tape archive (.tar) compressed with gzip, bzip2 or xz. If the tarball consists of a single directory, then the top-level path component of the files in the tarball is removed. The typical use of the function is to obtain external Nix expression dependencies, such as a particular version of Nixpkgs, e.g.

with import (fetchTarball https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/archive/nixos-14.12.tar.gz) {};

stdenv.mkDerivation { … }

The fetched tarball is cached for a certain amount of time (1 hour by default) in ~/.cache/nix/tarballs/. You can change the cache timeout either on the command line with --tarball-ttl number-of-seconds or in the Nix configuration file by adding the line tarball-ttl = number-of-seconds.

Note that when obtaining the hash with nix-prefetch-url the option --unpack is required.

This function can also verify the contents against a hash. In that case, the function takes a set instead of a URL. The set requires the attribute url and the attribute sha256, e.g.

with import (fetchTarball {
  url = "https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/archive/nixos-14.12.tar.gz";
  sha256 = "1jppksrfvbk5ypiqdz4cddxdl8z6zyzdb2srq8fcffr327ld5jj2";
}) {};

stdenv.mkDerivation { … }

Not available in restricted evaluation mode.

fetchTree input

Note

This function is only available if the fetch-tree experimental feature is enabled.

For example, include the following in nix.conf:

extra-experimental-features = fetch-tree

Fetch a file system tree or a plain file using one of the supported backends and return an attribute set with:

  • the resulting fixed-output store path
  • the corresponding NAR hash
  • backend-specific metadata (currently not documented).

input must be an attribute set with the following attributes:

  • type (String, required)

    One of the supported source types. This determines other required and allowed input attributes.

  • narHash (String, optional)

    The narHash parameter can be used to substitute the source of the tree. It also allows for verification of tree contents that may not be provided by the underlying transfer mechanism. If narHash is set, the source is first looked up is the Nix store and substituters, and only fetched if not available.

A subset of the output attributes of fetchTree can be re-used for subsequent calls to fetchTree to produce the same result again. That is, fetchTree is idempotent.

Downloads are cached in $XDG_CACHE_HOME/nix. The remote source will be fetched from the network if both are true:

  • A NAR hash is supplied and the corresponding store path is not valid, that is, not available in the store

    Note

    Substituters are not used in fetching.

  • There is no cache entry or the cache entry is older than tarball-ttl

Source types

The following source types and associated input attributes are supported.

  • "file"

    Place a plain file into the Nix store. This is similar to builtins.fetchurl

    • url (String, required)

      Supported protocols:

      • https

        Example

        fetchTree {
  type = "file";
  url = "https://example.com/index.html";
}

      • http

        Insecure HTTP transfer for legacy sources.

        Warning

        HTTP performs no encryption or authentication. Use a narHash known in advance to ensure the output has expected contents.

      • file

        A file on the local file system.

        Example

        fetchTree {
  type = "file";
  url = "file:///home/eelco/nix/README.md";
}

  • "tarball"

    Download a tar archive and extract it into the Nix store. This has the same underyling implementation as builtins.fetchTarball

    • url (String, required)

      Example

      fetchTree {
  type = "tarball";
  url = "https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/tarball/nixpkgs-23.11";
}

  • "git"

    Fetch a Git tree and copy it to the Nix store. This is similar to builtins.fetchGit.

    • url (String, required)

      The URL formats supported are the same as for Git itself.

      Example

      fetchTree {
  type = "git";
  url = "git@github.com:NixOS/nixpkgs.git";
}

      Note

      If the URL points to a local directory, and no ref or rev is given, Nix will only consider files added to the Git index, as listed by git ls-files but use the current file contents of the Git working directory.

    • ref (String, optional)

      By default, this has no effect. This becomes relevant only once shallow cloning is disabled.

      A Git reference, such as a branch or tag name.

      Default: "HEAD"

    • rev (String, optional)

      A Git revision; a commit hash.

      Default: the tip of ref

    • shallow (Bool, optional)

      Make a shallow clone when fetching the Git tree. When this is enabled, the options ref and allRefs have no effect anymore.

      Default: true

    • submodules (Bool, optional)

      Also fetch submodules if available.

      Default: false

    • allRefs (Bool, optional)

      By default, this has no effect. This becomes relevant only once shallow cloning is disabled.

      Whether to fetch all references (eg. branches and tags) of the repository. With this argument being true, it's possible to load a rev from any ref. (Without setting this option, only revs from the specified ref are supported).

      Default: false

    • lastModified (Integer, optional)

      Unix timestamp of the fetched commit.

      If set, pass through the value to the output attribute set. Otherwise, generated from the fetched Git tree.

    • revCount (Integer, optional)

      Number of revisions in the history of the Git repository before the fetched commit.

      If set, pass through the value to the output attribute set. Otherwise, generated from the fetched Git tree.

The following input types are still subject to change:

  • "path"
  • "github"
  • "gitlab"
  • "sourcehut"
  • "mercurial"

input can also be a URL-like reference. The additional input types and the URL-like syntax requires the flakes experimental feature to be enabled.

Example

Fetch a GitHub repository using the attribute set representation:

builtins.fetchTree {
  type = "github";
  owner = "NixOS";
  repo = "nixpkgs";
  rev = "ae2e6b3958682513d28f7d633734571fb18285dd";
}

This evaluates to the following attribute set:

{
  lastModified = 1686503798;
  lastModifiedDate = "20230611171638";
  narHash = "sha256-rA9RqKP9OlBrgGCPvfd5HVAXDOy8k2SmPtB/ijShNXc=";
  outPath = "/nix/store/l5m6qlvfs9sdw14ja3qbzpglcjlb6j1x-source";
  rev = "ae2e6b3958682513d28f7d633734571fb18285dd";
  shortRev = "ae2e6b3";
}

Example

Fetch the same GitHub repository using the URL-like syntax:

builtins.fetchTree "github:NixOS/nixpkgs/ae2e6b3958682513d28f7d633734571fb18285dd"
fetchurl arg

Download the specified URL and return the path of the downloaded file. arg can be either a string denoting the URL, or an attribute set with the following attributes:

  • url

    The URL of the file to download.

  • name (default: the last path component of the URL)

    A name for the file in the store. This can be useful if the URL has any characters that are invalid for the store.

Not available in restricted evaluation mode.

filter f list

Return a list consisting of the elements of list for which the function f returns true.

filterSource e1 e2

Warning

filterSource should not be used to filter store paths. Since filterSource uses the name of the input directory while naming the output directory, doing so will produce a directory name in the form of <hash2>-<hash>-<name>, where <hash>-<name> is the name of the input directory. Since <hash> depends on the unfiltered directory, the name of the output directory will indirectly depend on files that are filtered out by the function. This will trigger a rebuild even when a filtered out file is changed. Use builtins.path instead, which allows specifying the name of the output directory.

This function allows you to copy sources into the Nix store while filtering certain files. For instance, suppose that you want to use the directory source-dir as an input to a Nix expression, e.g.

stdenv.mkDerivation {
  ...
  src = ./source-dir;
}

However, if source-dir is a Subversion working copy, then all those annoying .svn subdirectories will also be copied to the store. Worse, the contents of those directories may change a lot, causing lots of spurious rebuilds. With filterSource you can filter out the .svn directories:

src = builtins.filterSource
  (path: type: type != "directory" || baseNameOf path != ".svn")
  ./source-dir;

Thus, the first argument e1 must be a predicate function that is called for each regular file, directory or symlink in the source tree e2. If the function returns true, the file is copied to the Nix store, otherwise it is omitted. The function is called with two arguments. The first is the full path of the file. The second is a string that identifies the type of the file, which is either "regular", "directory", "symlink" or "unknown" (for other kinds of files such as device nodes or fifos — but note that those cannot be copied to the Nix store, so if the predicate returns true for them, the copy will fail). If you exclude a directory, the entire corresponding subtree of e2 will be excluded.

findFile search-path lookup-path

Find lookup-path in search-path.

Lookup path expressions are desugared using this and builtins.nixPath:

<nixpkgs>

is equivalent to:

builtins.findFile builtins.nixPath "nixpkgs"

A search path is represented as a list of attribute sets with two attributes:

  • prefix is a relative path.
  • path denotes a file system location

Examples of search path attribute sets:

  • {
  prefix = "";
  path = "/nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user/root/channels";
}

  • {
  prefix = "nixos-config";
  path = "/etc/nixos/configuration.nix";
}

  • {
  prefix = "nixpkgs";
  path = "https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/tarballs/master";
}

  • {
  prefix = "nixpkgs";
  path = "channel:nixpkgs-unstable";
}

  • {
  prefix = "flake-compat";
  path = "flake:github:edolstra/flake-compat";
}

The lookup algorithm checks each entry until a match is found, returning a path value of the match:

  • If a prefix of lookup-path matches prefix, then the remainder of lookup-path (the "suffix") is searched for within the directory denoted by path. The contents of path may need to be downloaded at this point to look inside.

  • If the suffix is found inside that directory, then the entry is a match. The combined absolute path of the directory (now downloaded if need be) and the suffix is returned.

Example

A search-path value

[
  {
    prefix = "";
    path = "/home/eelco/Dev";
  }
  {
    prefix = "nixos-config";
    path = "/etc/nixos";
  }
]

and a lookup-path value "nixos-config" will cause Nix to try /home/eelco/Dev/nixos-config and /etc/nixos in that order and return the first path that exists.

If path starts with http:// or https://, it is interpreted as the URL of a tarball that will be downloaded and unpacked to a temporary location. The tarball must consist of a single top-level directory.

The URLs of the tarballs from the official nixos.org channels can be abbreviated as channel:<channel-name>. See documentation on nix-channel for details about channels.

Example

These two search path entries are equivalent:

  • {
  prefix = "nixpkgs";
  path = "channel:nixpkgs-unstable";
}

  • {
  prefix = "nixpkgs";
  path = "https://nixos.org/channels/nixos-unstable/nixexprs.tar.xz";
}

Search paths can also point to source trees using flake URLs.

Example

The search path entry

{
  prefix = "nixpkgs";
  path = "flake:nixpkgs";
}

specifies that the prefix nixpkgs shall refer to the source tree downloaded from the nixpkgs entry in the flake registry.

Similarly

{
  prefix = "nixpkgs";
  path = "flake:github:nixos/nixpkgs/nixos-22.05";
}

makes <nixpkgs> refer to a particular branch of the NixOS/nixpkgs repository on GitHub.

flakeRefToString attrs

Note

This function is only available if the flakes experimental feature is enabled.

For example, include the following in nix.conf:

extra-experimental-features = flakes

Convert a flake reference from attribute set format to URL format.

For example:

builtins.flakeRefToString {
  dir = "lib"; owner = "NixOS"; ref = "23.05"; repo = "nixpkgs"; type = "github";
}

evaluates to

"github:NixOS/nixpkgs/23.05?dir=lib"
floor double

Converts an IEEE-754 double-precision floating-point number (double) to the next lower integer.

If the datatype is neither an integer nor a "float", an evaluation error will be thrown.

foldl' op nul list

Reduce a list by applying a binary operator, from left to right, e.g. foldl' op nul [x0 x1 x2 ...] = op (op (op nul x0) x1) x2) ....

For example, foldl' (acc: elem: acc + elem) 0 [1 2 3] evaluates to 6 and foldl' (acc: elem: { "${elem}" = elem; } // acc) {} ["a" "b"] evaluates to { a = "a"; b = "b"; }.

The first argument of op is the accumulator whereas the second argument is the current element being processed. The return value of each application of op is evaluated immediately, even for intermediate values.

fromJSON e

Convert a JSON string to a Nix value. For example,

builtins.fromJSON ''{"x": [1, 2, 3], "y": null}''

returns the value { x = [ 1 2 3 ]; y = null; }.

fromTOML e

Convert a TOML string to a Nix value. For example,

builtins.fromTOML ''
  x=1
  s="a"
  [table]
  y=2
''

returns the value { s = "a"; table = { y = 2; }; x = 1; }.

functionArgs f

Return a set containing the names of the formal arguments expected by the function f. The value of each attribute is a Boolean denoting whether the corresponding argument has a default value. For instance, functionArgs ({ x, y ? 123}: ...) = { x = false; y = true; }.

"Formal argument" here refers to the attributes pattern-matched by the function. Plain lambdas are not included, e.g. functionArgs (x: ...) = { }.

genList generator length

Generate list of size length, with each element i equal to the value returned by generator i. For example,

builtins.genList (x: x * x) 5

returns the list [ 0 1 4 9 16 ].

genericClosure attrset

builtins.genericClosure iteratively computes the transitive closure over an arbitrary relation defined by a function.

It takes attrset with two attributes named startSet and operator, and returns a list of attribute sets:

  • startSet: The initial list of attribute sets.

  • operator: A function that takes an attribute set and returns a list of attribute sets. It defines how each item in the current set is processed and expanded into more items.

Each attribute set in the list startSet and the list returned by operator must have an attribute key, which must support equality comparison. The value of key can be one of the following types:

The result is produced by calling the operator on each item that has not been called yet, including newly added items, until no new items are added. Items are compared by their key attribute.

Common usages are:

  • Generating unique collections of items, such as dependency graphs.
  • Traversing through structures that may contain cycles or loops.
  • Processing data structures with complex internal relationships.

Example

builtins.genericClosure {
  startSet = [ {key = 5;} ];
  operator = item: [{
    key = if (item.key / 2 ) * 2 == item.key
         then item.key / 2
         else 3 * item.key + 1;
  }];
}

evaluates to

[ { key = 5; } { key = 16; } { key = 8; } { key = 4; } { key = 2; } { key = 1; } ]
getAttr s set

getAttr returns the attribute named s from set. Evaluation aborts if the attribute doesn’t exist. This is a dynamic version of the . operator, since s is an expression rather than an identifier.

getContext s

Return the string context of s.

The string context tracks references to derivations within a string. It is represented as an attribute set of store derivation paths mapping to output names.

Using string interpolation on a derivation will add that derivation to the string context. For example,

builtins.getContext "${derivation { name = "a"; builder = "b"; system = "c"; }}"

evaluates to

{ "/nix/store/arhvjaf6zmlyn8vh8fgn55rpwnxq0n7l-a.drv" = { outputs = [ "out" ]; }; }
getEnv s

getEnv returns the value of the environment variable s, or an empty string if the variable doesn’t exist. This function should be used with care, as it can introduce all sorts of nasty environment dependencies in your Nix expression.

getEnv is used in Nix Packages to locate the file ~/.nixpkgs/config.nix, which contains user-local settings for Nix Packages. (That is, it does a getEnv "HOME" to locate the user’s home directory.)

getFlake args

Note

This function is only available if the flakes experimental feature is enabled.

For example, include the following in nix.conf:

extra-experimental-features = flakes

Fetch a flake from a flake reference, and return its output attributes and some metadata. For example:

(builtins.getFlake "nix/55bc52401966fbffa525c574c14f67b00bc4fb3a").packages.x86_64-linux.nix

Unless impure evaluation is allowed (--impure), the flake reference must be "locked", e.g. contain a Git revision or content hash. An example of an unlocked usage is:

(builtins.getFlake "github:edolstra/dwarffs").rev
groupBy f list

Groups elements of list together by the string returned from the function f called on each element. It returns an attribute set where each attribute value contains the elements of list that are mapped to the same corresponding attribute name returned by f.

For example,

builtins.groupBy (builtins.substring 0 1) ["foo" "bar" "baz"]

evaluates to

{ b = [ "bar" "baz" ]; f = [ "foo" ]; }
hasAttr s set

hasAttr returns true if set has an attribute named s, and false otherwise. This is a dynamic version of the ? operator, since s is an expression rather than an identifier.

hasContext s

Return true if string s has a non-empty context. The context can be obtained with getContext.

Example

Many operations require a string context to be empty because they are intended only to work with "regular" strings, and also to help users avoid unintentionally loosing track of string context elements. builtins.hasContext can help create better domain-specific errors in those case.

name: meta:

if builtins.hasContext name
then throw "package name cannot contain string context"
else { ${name} = meta; }
hashFile type p

Return a base-16 representation of the cryptographic hash of the file at path p. The hash algorithm specified by type must be one of "md5", "sha1", "sha256" or "sha512".

hashString type s

Return a base-16 representation of the cryptographic hash of string s. The hash algorithm specified by type must be one of "md5", "sha1", "sha256" or "sha512".

head list

Return the first element of a list; abort evaluation if the argument isn’t a list or is an empty list. You can test whether a list is empty by comparing it with [].

import path

Load, parse, and return the Nix expression in the file path.

Note

Unlike some languages, import is a regular function in Nix.

The path argument must meet the same criteria as an interpolated expression.

If path is a directory, the file default.nix in that directory is used if it exists.

Example

$ echo 123 > default.nix

Import default.nix from the current directory.

import ./.

123

Evaluation aborts if the file doesn’t exist or contains an invalid Nix expression.

A Nix expression loaded by import must not contain any free variables, that is, identifiers that are not defined in the Nix expression itself and are not built-in. Therefore, it cannot refer to variables that are in scope at the call site.

Example

If you have a calling expression

rec {
  x = 123;
  y = import ./foo.nix;
}

then the following foo.nix will give an error:

# foo.nix
x + 456

since x is not in scope in foo.nix. If you want x to be available in foo.nix, pass it as a function argument:

rec {
  x = 123;
  y = import ./foo.nix x;
}

and

# foo.nix
x: x + 456

The function argument doesn’t have to be called x in foo.nix; any name would work.

intersectAttrs e1 e2

Return a set consisting of the attributes in the set e2 which have the same name as some attribute in e1.

Performs in O(n log m) where n is the size of the smaller set and m the larger set's size.

isAttrs e

Return true if e evaluates to a set, and false otherwise.

isBool e

Return true if e evaluates to a bool, and false otherwise.

isFloat e

Return true if e evaluates to a float, and false otherwise.

isFunction e

Return true if e evaluates to a function, and false otherwise.

isInt e

Return true if e evaluates to an integer, and false otherwise.

isList e

Return true if e evaluates to a list, and false otherwise.

isNull e

Return true if e evaluates to null, and false otherwise.

This is equivalent to e == null.

isPath e

Return true if e evaluates to a path, and false otherwise.

isString e

Return true if e evaluates to a string, and false otherwise.

langVersion (integer)

The current version of the Nix language.

length e

Return the length of the list e.

lessThan e1 e2

Return true if the number e1 is less than the number e2, and false otherwise. Evaluation aborts if either e1 or e2 does not evaluate to a number.

listToAttrs e

Construct a set from a list specifying the names and values of each attribute. Each element of the list should be a set consisting of a string-valued attribute name specifying the name of the attribute, and an attribute value specifying its value.

In case of duplicate occurrences of the same name, the first takes precedence.

Example:

builtins.listToAttrs
  [ { name = "foo"; value = 123; }
    { name = "bar"; value = 456; }
    { name = "bar"; value = 420; }
  ]

evaluates to

{ foo = 123; bar = 456; }
map f list

Apply the function f to each element in the list list. For example,

map (x: "foo" + x) [ "bar" "bla" "abc" ]

evaluates to [ "foobar" "foobla" "fooabc" ].

mapAttrs f attrset

Apply function f to every element of attrset. For example,

builtins.mapAttrs (name: value: value * 10) { a = 1; b = 2; }

evaluates to { a = 10; b = 20; }.

match regex str

Returns a list if the extended POSIX regular expression regex matches str precisely, otherwise returns null. Each item in the list is a regex group.

builtins.match "ab" "abc"

Evaluates to null.

builtins.match "abc" "abc"

Evaluates to [ ].

builtins.match "a(b)(c)" "abc"

Evaluates to [ "b" "c" ].

builtins.match "[[:space:]]+([[:upper:]]+)[[:space:]]+" "  FOO   "

Evaluates to [ "FOO" ].

mul e1 e2

Return the product of the numbers e1 and e2.

nixPath (list)

The value of the nix-path configuration setting: a list of search path entries used to resolve lookup paths.

Example

$ NIX_PATH= nix-instantiate --eval --expr "builtins.nixPath" -I foo=bar --no-pure-eval
[ { path = "bar"; prefix = "foo"; } ]

Lookup path expressions are desugared using this and builtins.findFile:

<nixpkgs>

is equivalent to:

builtins.findFile builtins.nixPath "nixpkgs"
nixVersion (string)

The version of Nix.

For example, where the command line returns the current Nix version,

$ nix --version
nix (Nix) 2.16.0

the Nix language evaluator returns the same value:

nix-repl> builtins.nixVersion
"2.16.0"
null (null)

Primitive value.

The name null is not special, and can be shadowed:

nix-repl> let null = 1; in null
1
outputOf derivation-reference output-name

Note

This function is only available if the dynamic-derivations experimental feature is enabled.

For example, include the following in nix.conf:

extra-experimental-features = dynamic-derivations

Return the output path of a derivation, literally or using a placeholder if needed.

If the derivation has a statically-known output path (i.e. the derivation output is input-addressed, or fixed content-addresed), the output path will just be returned. But if the derivation is content-addressed or if the derivation is itself not-statically produced (i.e. is the output of another derivation), a placeholder will be returned instead.

derivation reference must be a string that may contain a regular store path to a derivation, or may be a placeholder reference. If the derivation is produced by a derivation, you must explicitly select drv.outPath. This primop can be chained arbitrarily deeply. For instance,

builtins.outputOf
  (builtins.outputOf myDrv "out")
  "out"

will return a placeholder for the output of the output of myDrv.

This primop corresponds to the ^ sigil for derivable paths, e.g. as part of installable syntax on the command line.

parseDrvName s

Split the string s into a package name and version. The package name is everything up to but not including the first dash not followed by a letter, and the version is everything following that dash. The result is returned in a set { name, version }. Thus, builtins.parseDrvName "nix-0.12pre12876" returns { name = "nix"; version = "0.12pre12876"; }.

parseFlakeRef flake-ref

Note

This function is only available if the flakes experimental feature is enabled.

For example, include the following in nix.conf:

extra-experimental-features = flakes

Parse a flake reference, and return its exploded form.

For example:

builtins.parseFlakeRef "github:NixOS/nixpkgs/23.05?dir=lib"

evaluates to:

{ dir = "lib"; owner = "NixOS"; ref = "23.05"; repo = "nixpkgs"; type = "github"; }
partition pred list

Given a predicate function pred, this function returns an attrset containing a list named right, containing the elements in list for which pred returned true, and a list named wrong, containing the elements for which it returned false. For example,

builtins.partition (x: x > 10) [1 23 9 3 42]

evaluates to

{ right = [ 23 42 ]; wrong = [ 1 9 3 ]; }
path args

An enrichment of the built-in path type, based on the attributes present in args. All are optional except path:

  • path
    The underlying path.

  • name
    The name of the path when added to the store. This can used to reference paths that have nix-illegal characters in their names, like @.

  • filter
    A function of the type expected by builtins.filterSource, with the same semantics.

  • recursive
    When false, when path is added to the store it is with a flat hash, rather than a hash of the NAR serialization of the file. Thus, path must refer to a regular file, not a directory. This allows similar behavior to fetchurl. Defaults to true.

  • sha256
    When provided, this is the expected hash of the file at the path. Evaluation will fail if the hash is incorrect, and providing a hash allows builtins.path to be used even when the pure-eval nix config option is on.

pathExists path

Return true if the path path exists at evaluation time, and false otherwise.

placeholder output

Return a placeholder string for the specified output that will be substituted by the corresponding output path at build time. Typical outputs would be "out", "bin" or "dev".

readDir path

Return the contents of the directory path as a set mapping directory entries to the corresponding file type. For instance, if directory A contains a regular file B and another directory C, then builtins.readDir ./A will return the set

{ B = "regular"; C = "directory"; }

The possible values for the file type are "regular", "directory", "symlink" and "unknown".

readFile path

Return the contents of the file path as a string.

readFileType p

Determine the directory entry type of a filesystem node, being one of "directory", "regular", "symlink", or "unknown".

removeAttrs set list

Remove the attributes listed in list from set. The attributes don’t have to exist in set. For instance,

removeAttrs { x = 1; y = 2; z = 3; } [ "a" "x" "z" ]

evaluates to { y = 2; }.

replaceStrings from to s

Given string s, replace every occurrence of the strings in from with the corresponding string in to.

The argument to is lazy, that is, it is only evaluated when its corresponding pattern in from is matched in the string s

Example:

builtins.replaceStrings ["oo" "a"] ["a" "i"] "foobar"

evaluates to "fabir".

seq e1 e2

Evaluate e1, then evaluate and return e2. This ensures that a computation is strict in the value of e1.

sort comparator list

Return list in sorted order. It repeatedly calls the function comparator with two elements. The comparator should return true if the first element is less than the second, and false otherwise. For example,

builtins.sort builtins.lessThan [ 483 249 526 147 42 77 ]

produces the list [ 42 77 147 249 483 526 ].

This is a stable sort: it preserves the relative order of elements deemed equal by the comparator.

split regex str

Returns a list composed of non matched strings interleaved with the lists of the extended POSIX regular expression regex matches of str. Each item in the lists of matched sequences is a regex group.

builtins.split "(a)b" "abc"

Evaluates to [ "" [ "a" ] "c" ].

builtins.split "([ac])" "abc"

Evaluates to [ "" [ "a" ] "b" [ "c" ] "" ].

builtins.split "(a)|(c)" "abc"

Evaluates to [ "" [ "a" null ] "b" [ null "c" ] "" ].

builtins.split "([[:upper:]]+)" " FOO "

Evaluates to [ " " [ "FOO" ] " " ].

splitVersion s

Split a string representing a version into its components, by the same version splitting logic underlying the version comparison in nix-env -u.

storeDir (string)

Logical file system location of the Nix store currently in use.

This value is determined by the store parameter in Store URLs:

$ nix-instantiate --store 'dummy://?store=/blah' --eval --expr builtins.storeDir
"/blah"
storePath path

This function allows you to define a dependency on an already existing store path. For example, the derivation attribute src = builtins.storePath /nix/store/f1d18v1y…-source causes the derivation to depend on the specified path, which must exist or be substitutable. Note that this differs from a plain path (e.g. src = /nix/store/f1d18v1y…-source) in that the latter causes the path to be copied again to the Nix store, resulting in a new path (e.g. /nix/store/ld01dnzc…-source-source).

Not available in pure evaluation mode.

See also builtins.fetchClosure.

stringLength e

Return the number of bytes of the string e. If e is not a string, evaluation is aborted.

sub e1 e2

Return the difference between the numbers e1 and e2.

substring start len s

Return the substring of s from character position start (zero-based) up to but not including start + len. If start is greater than the length of the string, an empty string is returned. If start + len lies beyond the end of the string or len is -1, only the substring up to the end of the string is returned. start must be non-negative. For example,

builtins.substring 0 3 "nixos"

evaluates to "nix".

tail list

Return the list without its first item; abort evaluation if the argument isn’t a list or is an empty list.

Warning

This function should generally be avoided since it's inefficient: unlike Haskell's tail, it takes O(n) time, so recursing over a list by repeatedly calling tail takes O(n^2) time.

throw s

Throw an error message s. This usually aborts Nix expression evaluation, but in nix-env -qa and other commands that try to evaluate a set of derivations to get information about those derivations, a derivation that throws an error is silently skipped (which is not the case for abort).

toFile name s

Store the string s in a file in the Nix store and return its path. The file has suffix name. This file can be used as an input to derivations. One application is to write builders “inline”. For instance, the following Nix expression combines the Nix expression for GNU Hello and its build script into one file:

{ stdenv, fetchurl, perl }:

stdenv.mkDerivation {
  name = "hello-2.1.1";

  builder = builtins.toFile "builder.sh" "
    source $stdenv/setup

    PATH=$perl/bin:$PATH

    tar xvfz $src
    cd hello-*
    ./configure --prefix=$out
    make
    make install
  ";

  src = fetchurl {
    url = "http://ftp.nluug.nl/pub/gnu/hello/hello-2.1.1.tar.gz";
    sha256 = "1md7jsfd8pa45z73bz1kszpp01yw6x5ljkjk2hx7wl800any6465";
  };
  inherit perl;
}

It is even possible for one file to refer to another, e.g.,

builder = let
  configFile = builtins.toFile "foo.conf" "
    # This is some dummy configuration file.
    ...
  ";
in builtins.toFile "builder.sh" "
  source $stdenv/setup
  ...
  cp ${configFile} $out/etc/foo.conf
";

Note that ${configFile} is a string interpolation, so the result of the expression configFile (i.e., a path like /nix/store/m7p7jfny445k...-foo.conf) will be spliced into the resulting string.

It is however not allowed to have files mutually referring to each other, like so:

let
  foo = builtins.toFile "foo" "...${bar}...";
  bar = builtins.toFile "bar" "...${foo}...";
in foo

This is not allowed because it would cause a cyclic dependency in the computation of the cryptographic hashes for foo and bar.

It is also not possible to reference the result of a derivation. If you are using Nixpkgs, the writeTextFile function is able to do that.

toJSON e

Return a string containing a JSON representation of e. Strings, integers, floats, booleans, nulls and lists are mapped to their JSON equivalents. Sets (except derivations) are represented as objects. Derivations are translated to a JSON string containing the derivation’s output path. Paths are copied to the store and represented as a JSON string of the resulting store path.

toPath s

DEPRECATED. Use /. + "/path" to convert a string into an absolute path. For relative paths, use ./. + "/path".

toString e

Convert the expression e to a string. e can be:

  • A string (in which case the string is returned unmodified).

  • A path (e.g., toString /foo/bar yields "/foo/bar".

  • A set containing { __toString = self: ...; } or { outPath = ...; }.

  • An integer.

  • A list, in which case the string representations of its elements are joined with spaces.

  • A Boolean (false yields "", true yields "1").

  • null, which yields the empty string.

toXML e

Return a string containing an XML representation of e. The main application for toXML is to communicate information with the builder in a more structured format than plain environment variables.

Here is an example where this is the case:

{ stdenv, fetchurl, libxslt, jira, uberwiki }:

stdenv.mkDerivation (rec {
  name = "web-server";

  buildInputs = [ libxslt ];

  builder = builtins.toFile "builder.sh" "
    source $stdenv/setup
    mkdir $out
    echo "$servlets" | xsltproc ${stylesheet} - > $out/server-conf.xml ①
  ";

  stylesheet = builtins.toFile "stylesheet.xsl" ②
   "<?xml version='1.0' encoding='UTF-8'?>
    <xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl='http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform' version='1.0'>
      <xsl:template match='/'>
        <Configure>
          <xsl:for-each select='/expr/list/attrs'>
            <Call name='addWebApplication'>
              <Arg><xsl:value-of select=\"attr[@name = 'path']/string/@value\" /></Arg>
              <Arg><xsl:value-of select=\"attr[@name = 'war']/path/@value\" /></Arg>
            </Call>
          </xsl:for-each>
        </Configure>
      </xsl:template>
    </xsl:stylesheet>
  ";

  servlets = builtins.toXML [ ③
    { path = "/bugtracker"; war = jira + "/lib/atlassian-jira.war"; }
    { path = "/wiki"; war = uberwiki + "/uberwiki.war"; }
  ];
})

The builder is supposed to generate the configuration file for a Jetty servlet container. A servlet container contains a number of servlets (*.war files) each exported under a specific URI prefix. So the servlet configuration is a list of sets containing the path and war of the servlet (①). This kind of information is difficult to communicate with the normal method of passing information through an environment variable, which just concatenates everything together into a string (which might just work in this case, but wouldn’t work if fields are optional or contain lists themselves). Instead the Nix expression is converted to an XML representation with toXML, which is unambiguous and can easily be processed with the appropriate tools. For instance, in the example an XSLT stylesheet (at point ②) is applied to it (at point ①) to generate the XML configuration file for the Jetty server. The XML representation produced at point ③ by toXML is as follows:

<?xml version='1.0' encoding='utf-8'?>
<expr>
  <list>
    <attrs>
      <attr name="path">
        <string value="/bugtracker" />
      </attr>
      <attr name="war">
        <path value="/nix/store/d1jh9pasa7k2...-jira/lib/atlassian-jira.war" />
      </attr>
    </attrs>
    <attrs>
      <attr name="path">
        <string value="/wiki" />
      </attr>
      <attr name="war">
        <path value="/nix/store/y6423b1yi4sx...-uberwiki/uberwiki.war" />
      </attr>
    </attrs>
  </list>
</expr>

Note that we used the toFile built-in to write the builder and the stylesheet “inline” in the Nix expression. The path of the stylesheet is spliced into the builder using the syntax xsltproc ${stylesheet}.

trace e1 e2

Evaluate e1 and print its abstract syntax representation on standard error. Then return e2. This function is useful for debugging.

If the debugger-on-trace option is set to true and the --debugger flag is given, the interactive debugger will be started when trace is called (like break).

traceVerbose e1 e2

Evaluate e1 and print its abstract syntax representation on standard error if --trace-verbose is enabled. Then return e2. This function is useful for debugging.

true (Boolean)

Primitive value.

It can be returned by comparison operators and used in conditional expressions.

The name true is not special, and can be shadowed:

nix-repl> let true = 1; in true
1
tryEval e

Try to shallowly evaluate e. Return a set containing the attributes success (true if e evaluated successfully, false if an error was thrown) and value, equalling e if successful and false otherwise. tryEval will only prevent errors created by throw or assert from being thrown. Errors tryEval will not catch are for example those created by abort and type errors generated by builtins. Also note that this doesn't evaluate e deeply, so let e = { x = throw ""; }; in (builtins.tryEval e).success will be true. Using builtins.deepSeq one can get the expected result: let e = { x = throw ""; }; in (builtins.tryEval (builtins.deepSeq e e)).success will be false.

typeOf e

Return a string representing the type of the value e, namely "int", "bool", "string", "path", "null", "set", "list", "lambda" or "float".

unsafeDiscardOutputDependency s

Create a copy of the given string where every derivation deep string context element is turned into a constant string context element.

This is the opposite of builtins.addDrvOutputDependencies.

This is unsafe because it allows us to "forget" store objects we would have otherwise refered to with the string context, whereas Nix normally tracks all dependencies consistently. Safe operations "grow" but never "shrink" string contexts. builtins.addDrvOutputDependencies in contrast is safe because "derivation deep" string context element always refers to the underlying derivation (among many more things). Replacing a constant string context element with a "derivation deep" element is a safe operation that just enlargens the string context without forgetting anything.

unsafeDiscardStringContext s

Discard the string context from a value that can be coerced to a string.

warn e1 e2

Evaluate e1, which must be a string and print iton standard error as a warning. Then return e2. This function is useful for non-critical situations where attention is advisable.

If the debugger-on-trace or debugger-on-warn option is set to true and the --debugger flag is given, the interactive debugger will be started when warn is called (like break).

If the abort-on-warn option is set, the evaluation will be aborted after the warning is printed. This is useful to reveal the stack trace of the warning, when the context is non-interactive and a debugger can not be launched.

zipAttrsWith f list

Transpose a list of attribute sets into an attribute set of lists, then apply mapAttrs.

f receives two arguments: the attribute name and a non-empty list of all values encountered for that attribute name.

The result is an attribute set where the attribute names are the union of the attribute names in each element of list. The attribute values are the return values of f.

builtins.zipAttrsWith
  (name: values: { inherit name values; })
  [ { a = "x"; } { a = "y"; b = "z"; } ]

evaluates to

{
  a = { name = "a"; values = [ "x" "y" ]; };
  b = { name = "b"; values = [ "z" ]; };
}