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diff --git a/doc/manual/packages/binary-cache-substituter.xml b/doc/manual/packages/binary-cache-substituter.xml new file mode 100644 index 000000000000..c6ceb9c80610 --- /dev/null +++ b/doc/manual/packages/binary-cache-substituter.xml @@ -0,0 +1,70 @@ +<section xmlns="http://docbook.org/ns/docbook" + xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" + xmlns:xi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XInclude" + version="5.0" + xml:id="ssec-binary-cache-substituter"> + +<title>Serving a Nix store via HTTP</title> + +<para>You can easily share the Nix store of a machine via HTTP. This +allows other machines to fetch store paths from that machine to speed +up installations. It uses the same <emphasis>binary cache</emphasis> +mechanism that Nix usually uses to fetch pre-built binaries from +<uri>https://cache.nixos.org</uri>.</para> + +<para>The daemon that handles binary cache requests via HTTP, +<command>nix-serve</command>, is not part of the Nix distribution, but +you can install it from Nixpkgs: + +<screen> +$ nix-env -i nix-serve +</screen> + +You can then start the server, listening for HTTP connections on +whatever port you like: + +<screen> +$ nix-serve -p 8080 +</screen> + +To check whether it works, try the following on the client: + +<screen> +$ curl http://avalon:8080/nix-cache-info +</screen> + +which should print something like: + +<screen> +StoreDir: /nix/store +WantMassQuery: 1 +Priority: 30 +</screen> + +</para> + +<para>On the client side, you can tell Nix to use your binary cache +using <option>--option extra-binary-caches</option>, e.g.: + +<screen> +$ nix-env -i firefox --option extra-binary-caches http://avalon:8080/ +</screen> + +The option <option>extra-binary-caches</option> tells Nix to use this +binary cache in addition to your default caches, such as +<uri>https://cache.nixos.org</uri>. Thus, for any path in the closure +of Firefox, Nix will first check if the path is available on the +server <literal>avalon</literal> or another binary caches. If not, it +will fall back to building from source.</para> + +<para>You can also tell Nix to always use your binary cache by adding +a line to the <filename linkend="sec-conf-file">nix.conf</filename> +configuration file like this: + +<programlisting> +binary-caches = http://avalon:8080/ https://cache.nixos.org/ +</programlisting> + +</para> + +</section> |