nix-super/src/nix/shell.md

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Examples

• Start a shell providing youtube-dl from the nixpkgs flake:

  # nix shell nixpkgs#youtube-dl
  # youtube-dl --version
  2020.11.01.1
  

• Start a shell providing GNU Hello from NixOS 20.03:

  # nix shell nixpkgs/nixos-20.03#hello
  

• Run GNU Hello:

  # nix shell nixpkgs#hello -c hello --greeting 'Hi everybody!'
  Hi everybody!
  

• Run multiple commands in a shell environment:

  # nix shell nixpkgs#gnumake -c sh -c "cd src && make"
  

• Run GNU Hello in a chroot store:

  # nix shell --store ~/my-nix nixpkgs#hello -c hello
  

• Start a shell providing GNU Hello in a chroot store:

  # nix shell --store ~/my-nix nixpkgs#hello nixpkgs#bashInteractive -c bash
  

  Note that it's necessary to specify bash explicitly because your default shell (e.g. /bin/bash) generally will not exist in the chroot.

Description

nix shell runs a command in an environment in which the $PATH variable provides the specified installables. If no command is specified, it starts the default shell of your user account specified by $SHELL.

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