This chapter is for impatient people who don't like reading documentation. For more in-depth information you are kindly referred to the following chapters. Download a source tarball or RPM or Debian/Ubuntu package from . Build source distributions using the regular sequence: $ tar xvfj nix-version.tar.bz2 $ ./configure $ make $ make install (as root) This will install the Nix binaries in /usr/local and keep the Nix store and other state in /nix. You can change the former by specifying --prefix=path. The location of the store can be changed using --with-store-dir=path. However, you shouldn't change the store location, if at all possible, since that will make it impossible to use pre-built binaries from the Nixpkgs channel and other channels. The location of the state can be changed using --localstatedir=path. You should add prefix/etc/profile.d/nix.sh to your ~/.bashrc (or some other login file). Subscribe to the Nix Packages channel. $ nix-channel --add http://nixos.org/channels/nixpkgs-unstable Download the latest Nix expressions available in the channel. $ nix-channel --update Note that this in itself doesn't download any packages, it just downloads the Nix expressions that build them and stores them somewhere (under ~/.nix-defexpr, in case you're curious). Also, it registers the fact that pre-built binaries are available remotely. See what installable packages are currently available in the channel: $ nix-env -qa \* docbook-xml-4.2 firefox-1.0pre-PR-0.10.1 hello-2.1.1 libxslt-1.1.0 ... Install some packages from the channel: $ nix-env -i hello firefox ... This should download pre-built packages; it should not build them locally (if it does, something went wrong). Test that they work: $ which hello /home/eelco/.nix-profile/bin/hello $ hello Hello, world! $ firefox (read Slashdot or something) Uninstall a package: $ nix-env -e hello To keep up-to-date with the channel, do: $ nix-channel --update $ nix-env -u '*' The latter command will upgrade each installed package for which there is a “newer” version (as determined by comparing the version numbers). You can also install specific packages directly from your web browser. For instance, you can go to and click on any link for the individual packages for your platform. Associate application/nix-package with the program nix-install-package. A window should appear asking you whether it’s okay to install the package. Say Y. The package and all its dependencies will be installed. If you're unhappy with the result of a nix-env action (e.g., an upgraded package turned out not to work properly), you can go back: $ nix-env --rollback You should periodically run the Nix garbage collector to get rid of unused packages, since uninstalls or upgrades don't actually delete them: $ nix-collect-garbage -d