PIN CHannels - a simple drop-in replacement for nix-channel --update.
Example usage, being invoked on the example "channels" file included here:
$ pinch pin channels
$ pinch update channels
The first "pin" command will add these fields to the file:
[nixos]
channel_url = https://channels.nixos.org/nixos-20.03
git_repo = https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs.git
git_ref = nixos-20.03
+release_name = nixos-20.03beta1155.29eddfc36d7
+tarball_url = https://releases.nixos.org/nixos/20.03/nixos-20.03beta1155.29eddfc36d7/nixexprs.tar.xz
+tarball_sha256 = 9c1d182af2af64e5e8799e256a4a6dc1fed324ba06cb5f76c938dc63b64f0959
+git_revision = 29eddfc36d720dcc4822581175217543b387b1e8
[nixos-hardware]
git_repo = https://github.com/NixOS/nixos-hardware.git
git_ref = master
+release_name = nixos-hardware.git-1585241157-edb7199b5c4
+git_revision = edb7199b5c4f1db34a7253d4cabf6cf690521a92
The second "update" command applies these changes to your nix channels, like nix-channel --update does.
| Feature | nix-channel | require.nix | niv | flakes | pinch |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Same version across machines | - | yes | yes | yes | yes |
| Verifies hashes | - | ? | yes | yes | yes |
| Fetch from git | - | ? | yes | yes | yes |
| Fetch from git with ssh key | - | ? | yes | yes? | yes |
| command_not_found_handle | yes | ? | - | yes | yes |
| Verifies tarball == git repo | - | - | - | - | yes |
| Rejects force pushes | - | - | - | - | yes |
| Ready to use today | yes | - | yes | yes | yes |
See also auto-upgrade-with-pinch.