Note
This is a work-in-progress, and a proof of concept. With that said, it works.
To do a test drive, run:
nix-build -A packages.hello -A packages.grep
This is currently using an arbitrary core and extra repository db, from the
time I published this.
The API currently used in default.nix is far from final. This initial proof
of concept is about making the build tooling work, rather than working out the
best developer experience.
Not really.
Currently, as an implementation detail, it relies on Nixpkgs to provide a bootstrap static seed of busybox, bubblewrap, libarchive and strace.
They could be provided by some other means too.
Otherwise, once the bootstrap seed is built, everything is done without involving Nixpkgs.
Because building Arch Linux packages is hard.
Because building Arch Linux packages is not difficult enough.
As an experiment. To see if it was possible.
There's no end-goal currently, but this definitely could be used as the backing of a build system for an operating system built on top of Arch Linux, where tracking all inputs is necessary.
This could also be used to make a configuration system, not unlike the one in NixOS, where a whole Arch Linux system is created out from nothing. Great for image-based deployments, as it would allow benefiting from some of the smantics of how Nix (the language and build tooling) operates, while still providing the familiar "classic" distro feeling for end-users.