How to use `mkOutOfStoreSymlink` in modules ?

[Bruno Boi]

Hello ;-)

I am trying to use mkOutOfStoreSymlink from home-manager in my modules but I get this error:

       error: attribute 'file' missing

       at /nix/store/z4bfxx4ida05kgvfasa9q5pbam9dg5f0-xy5h7vw7zcajp7r724hh2w691qy94v8z-source/modules/nixos/desktop/awesome/default.nix:20:18:

           19|       awesome = {
           20|         source = lib.file.mkOutOfStoreSymlink ./config;
             |                  ^
           21|         recursive = true;
       Did you mean one of filter, fix, fix', fold or pipe?

Here's a short snippet of what I am trying to achieve

{config, lib}:
{
  config.plusultra.home.configFile = {
    awesome = {
      source = lib.file.mkOutOfStoreSymlink ./config;
      recursive = true;
    };
  };
}

Thanks a lot for any help ;-)

[Jake Hamilton]

Hey! I think you're missing config at the beginning of that call. It should be:

config.lib.file.mkOutOfStoreSymlink

https://github.com/nix-community/home-manager/wiki/FAQ

[Bruno Boi]

Thank you for your reply, and sorry for the typo but I did not miss it in my file.

So the above snippet should have been.

{config, lib}:
{
  config.plusultra.home.configFile = {
    awesome = {
      source = config.lib.file.mkOutOfStoreSymlink ./config;
      recursive = true;
    };
  };
}

It seems that somehow the home-manager context is not available when the module is loaded.

EDIT: the traceback is still the same

       error: attribute 'file' missing

       at /nix/store/qb12m9pi2kjy0rsk4scs9k5ix4ris2sq-24cy873i8hj2djnhmcgf8bnsbg0wcsdv-source/modules/nixos/desktop/awesome/default.nix:20:18:

           19|       awesome = {
           20|         source = config.lib.file.mkOutOfStoreSymlink ./config;
             |                  ^
           21|         recursive = true;

[Jake Hamilton]

Oh I see, this is in your system configuration and not in a home manager module. I would suggest putting this into a home manager module since the config is different. But you may be able to get away with using home-manager.users.${my-user}.lib.file.mkOutOfStoreSymlink. I'm not entirely sure if that'll work, but it's worth a try.

This is happening because there are two different module system instances:

• NixOS
• Home Manager

Things can get confusing when you pass things down to the HM config from within the NixOS config. If you instead load a Home Manager module instead then you won't have this same context confusion.