Background

Much in the same vain as my nix-shell (note to self), I'm going to leave a note to my future self on how to install packages using nix-env, which is something I do once in a blue moon.

Solution

λ nix-env -iA tvix.eval -f /depot

Looks like I was forgetting the -f /depot option all this time:

--file / -f path Specifies the Nix expression (designated below as the active Nix expression) used by the --install, --upgrade, and --query --available operations to obtain derivations. The default is ~/.nix-defexpr.

• man nix-env

Failed Attempts (don't try these at home)

This section is brought to you by my shell's Ctrl-r!

λ nix-env -I depot=/depot -iA depot.tvix.eval
λ NIX_PATH=depot=/depot nix-env -iA depot.tvix.eval
λ nix-env -iE '(import /depot {}).tvix.eval'

Thanks for reading!