This is a boilerplate for someone wanting to build a Nix-Darwin flake.

This is intended to be used as a starting point, so it would make most sense, to create a new template from this repository and modify it to fit your needs.

Features:

Codifies the following settings (in no particular order):

• Basic user configuration in roles/user.nix
• Installed applications with brew in roles/brew.nix
• Tiling windows and custom keyboard shortcuts with Yabai and SKHD in roles/yabai.nix
• Firefox configuration with Home-Manager in roles/home-manager/user.nix:
  • Default Firefox profile named default:

    nix-darwin-flake/roles/home-manager/user.nix

    Lines 10 to 121 in c4f90bd

    	profiles.default = {
    	search.force = true; # This is required so the build won't fail each time
    	# View extensions here: https://github.com/nix-community/nur-combined/blob/master/repos/rycee/pkgs/firefox-addons/generated-firefox-addons.nix
    	extensions = with pkgs.nur.repos.rycee.firefox-addons; [
    	bitwarden
    	darkreader
    	firenvim
    	gnome-shell-integration
    	okta-browser-plugin
    	privacy-badger
    	private-relay
    	redirector
    	ublock-origin
    	vimium
    	];
    	userChrome = ''
    	/* * Do not remove the @namespace line -- it's required for correct functioning */
    	/* set default namespace to XUL */
    	@namespace url("http://www.mozilla.org/keymaster/gatekeeper/there.is.only.xul");
    	/* Remove Back button when there's nothing to go Back to */
    	#back-button[disabled="true"] { display: none; }
    	/* Remove Forward button when there's nothing to go Forward to */
    	#forward-button[disabled="true"] { display: none; }
    	/* Remove Home button (never use it) */
    	#home-button { display: none; }
    	.titlebar-spacer {
    	display: none !important;
    	}
    	/* Remove import bookmarks button */
    	#import-button {
    	display: none;
    	}
    	/* Remove bookmark toolbar */
    	toolbarbutton.bookmark-item:not(.subviewbutton) {
    	display: none;
    	}
    	/* Remove whitespace in toolbar */
    	#nav-bar toolbarpaletteitem[id^="wrapper-customizableui-special-spring"], #nav-bar toolbarspring {
    	display: none;
    	}
    	/* Hide dumb Firefox View button */
    	#firefox-view-button {
    	visibility: hidden;
    	}
    	/* Hide Firefox tab icon */
    	.tab-icon-image {
    	display: none;
    	}
    	'';
    	isDefault = true;
    	name = "default";
    	settings = {
    	"app.shield.optoutstudies.enabled" = false;
    	"browser.bookmarks.restore_default_bookmarks" = false;
    	"browser.bookmarks.showMobileBookmarks" = false;
    	"browser.compactmode.show" = true;
    	"browser.formfill.enable" = false;
    	"browser.newtabpage.activity-stream.feeds.section.topstories" = false;
    	"browser.newtabpage.activity-stream.feeds.telemetry" = false;
    	"browser.newtabpage.activity-stream.feeds.topsites" = false;
    	"browser.newtabpage.activity-stream.improvesearch.topSiteSearchShortcuts.havePinned" = "duckduckgo";
    	"browser.newtabpage.activity-stream.showSponsored" = false;
    	"browser.newtabpage.activity-stream.telemetry" = false;
    	"browser.ping-centre.telemetry" = false;
    	"browser.search.isUS" = true;
    	"browser.search.suggest.enabled" = false;
    	"browser.tabs.drawInTitlebar" = true;
    	"browser.urlbar.quicksuggest.scenario" = "offline";
    	"browser.urlbar.suggest.engines" = false;
    	"browser.urlbar.suggest.quicksuggest.nonsponsored" = false;
    	"browser.urlbar.suggest.quicksuggest.sponsored" = false;
    	"browser.urlbar.suggest.topsites" = false;
    	"experiments.activeExperiment" = false;
    	"experiments.enabled" = false;
    	"experiments.supported" = false;
    	"extensions.activeThemeID" = "[email protected]";
    	"extensions.formautofill.addresses.enabled" = false;
    	"extensions.formautofill.creditCards.enabled" = false;
    	"extensions.pocket.enabled" = false;
    	"extensions.pocket.showHome" = false;
    	"extensions.webextensions.restrictedDomains" = "";
    	"datareporting.healthreport.uploadEnabled" = false;
    	"datareporting.policy.dataSubmissionEnabled" = false;
    	"network.allow-experiments" = false;
    	"signon.rememberSignons" = false;
    	"signon.rememberSignons.visibilityToggle" = false;
    	"svg.context-properties.content.enabled" = true;
    	"toolkit.legacyUserProfileCustomizations.stylesheets" = true;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.archive.enabled" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.bhrPing.enabled" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.coverage.opt-out" = true;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.enabled" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.firstShutdownPing.enabled" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.hybridContent.enabled" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.newProfilePing.enabled" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.prompted" = 2;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.rejected" = true;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.reportingpolicy.firstRun" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.shutdownPingSender.enabled" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.unified" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.unifiedIsOptIn" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.updatePing.enabled" = false;
    	};

  • Better Firefox privacy tweaks:

    nix-darwin-flake/roles/home-manager/user.nix

    Lines 70 to 121 in c4f90bd

    	settings = {
    	"app.shield.optoutstudies.enabled" = false;
    	"browser.bookmarks.restore_default_bookmarks" = false;
    	"browser.bookmarks.showMobileBookmarks" = false;
    	"browser.compactmode.show" = true;
    	"browser.formfill.enable" = false;
    	"browser.newtabpage.activity-stream.feeds.section.topstories" = false;
    	"browser.newtabpage.activity-stream.feeds.telemetry" = false;
    	"browser.newtabpage.activity-stream.feeds.topsites" = false;
    	"browser.newtabpage.activity-stream.improvesearch.topSiteSearchShortcuts.havePinned" = "duckduckgo";
    	"browser.newtabpage.activity-stream.showSponsored" = false;
    	"browser.newtabpage.activity-stream.telemetry" = false;
    	"browser.ping-centre.telemetry" = false;
    	"browser.search.isUS" = true;
    	"browser.search.suggest.enabled" = false;
    	"browser.tabs.drawInTitlebar" = true;
    	"browser.urlbar.quicksuggest.scenario" = "offline";
    	"browser.urlbar.suggest.engines" = false;
    	"browser.urlbar.suggest.quicksuggest.nonsponsored" = false;
    	"browser.urlbar.suggest.quicksuggest.sponsored" = false;
    	"browser.urlbar.suggest.topsites" = false;
    	"experiments.activeExperiment" = false;
    	"experiments.enabled" = false;
    	"experiments.supported" = false;
    	"extensions.activeThemeID" = "[email protected]";
    	"extensions.formautofill.addresses.enabled" = false;
    	"extensions.formautofill.creditCards.enabled" = false;
    	"extensions.pocket.enabled" = false;
    	"extensions.pocket.showHome" = false;
    	"extensions.webextensions.restrictedDomains" = "";
    	"datareporting.healthreport.uploadEnabled" = false;
    	"datareporting.policy.dataSubmissionEnabled" = false;
    	"network.allow-experiments" = false;
    	"signon.rememberSignons" = false;
    	"signon.rememberSignons.visibilityToggle" = false;
    	"svg.context-properties.content.enabled" = true;
    	"toolkit.legacyUserProfileCustomizations.stylesheets" = true;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.archive.enabled" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.bhrPing.enabled" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.coverage.opt-out" = true;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.enabled" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.firstShutdownPing.enabled" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.hybridContent.enabled" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.newProfilePing.enabled" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.prompted" = 2;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.rejected" = true;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.reportingpolicy.firstRun" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.shutdownPingSender.enabled" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.unified" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.unifiedIsOptIn" = false;
    	"toolkit.telemetry.updatePing.enabled" = false;
    	};

  • Minimal Firefox appearance tweaks with UserChrome.css:

    nix-darwin-flake/roles/home-manager/user.nix

    Lines 25 to 67 in c4f90bd

    	userChrome = ''
    	/* * Do not remove the @namespace line -- it's required for correct functioning */
    	/* set default namespace to XUL */
    	@namespace url("http://www.mozilla.org/keymaster/gatekeeper/there.is.only.xul");
    	/* Remove Back button when there's nothing to go Back to */
    	#back-button[disabled="true"] { display: none; }
    	/* Remove Forward button when there's nothing to go Forward to */
    	#forward-button[disabled="true"] { display: none; }
    	/* Remove Home button (never use it) */
    	#home-button { display: none; }
    	.titlebar-spacer {
    	display: none !important;
    	}
    	/* Remove import bookmarks button */
    	#import-button {
    	display: none;
    	}
    	/* Remove bookmark toolbar */
    	toolbarbutton.bookmark-item:not(.subviewbutton) {
    	display: none;
    	}
    	/* Remove whitespace in toolbar */
    	#nav-bar toolbarpaletteitem[id^="wrapper-customizableui-special-spring"], #nav-bar toolbarspring {
    	display: none;
    	}
    	/* Hide dumb Firefox View button */
    	#firefox-view-button {
    	visibility: hidden;
    	}
    	/* Hide Firefox tab icon */
    	.tab-icon-image {
    	display: none;
    	}
    	'';

  • Installed Firefox Extensions with NUR:

    nix-darwin-flake/roles/home-manager/user.nix

    Lines 13 to 24 in c4f90bd

    	extensions = with pkgs.nur.repos.rycee.firefox-addons; [
    	bitwarden
    	darkreader
    	firenvim
    	gnome-shell-integration
    	okta-browser-plugin
    	privacy-badger
    	private-relay
    	redirector
    	ublock-origin
    	vimium
    	];

• Other various settings in roles

Requirements:

• Relatively modern MacOS version
• Nix installed: https://nixos.org/download.html#nix-install-macos
• Nix-Darwin installed: https://github.com/LnL7/nix-darwin#install

Quickstart:

Assuming you want to build the m2-macbook-air output, you'd use these commands:

git clone https://github.com/heywoodlh/nix-darwin-flake
cd nix-darwin-flake
darwin-rebuild switch --flake .#m2-macbook-air

Making this your own:

First, create a new repository using this repository as your template, using the following link:

https://github.com/heywoodlh/nix-darwin-flake/generate

Create a new MacOS configuration/output for your own machine in the darwinConfigurations section in flake.nix. Suppose that we wanted to name this output mac-mini, we would create an output in the darwinConfigurations section like this:

      # M1 mac-mini
      "mac-mini" = darwin.lib.darwinSystem {
        system = "aarch64-darwin";
        specialArgs = inputs;
        modules = [ ./hosts/mac-mini.nix ];
      };

Then, create a new file in ./hosts/mac-mini.nix with the following configuration (modify the hostname and username variables in the let section to match your desired values):

{ config, pkgs, lib, home-manager, nur, ... }:

let
  hostname = "mac-mini";
  username = "heywoodlh";
in {
  imports = [
    ../roles/m1.nix
    ../roles/defaults.nix
    ../roles/brew.nix
    ../roles/yabai.nix
    ../roles/network.nix
    ../roles/home-manager/settings.nix
  ];
  # Define user settings
  users.users.${username} = import ../roles/user.nix { inherit config; inherit pkgs; };

  # Set home-manager configs for username
  home-manager.users.${username} = import ../roles/home-manager/user.nix;

  # Set hostname
  networking.hostName = "${hostname}";

  system.stateVersion = 4;
}

Once your configuration is set, you can switch to the new mac-mini output with these commands (while in the root directory of this repository):

darwin-rebuild switch --flake .#mac-mini

Once your configuration is working, start modifying your new repository with your desired Nix-Darwin settings! Here are some resources for getting started:

• Nix-Darwin configuration options: https://daiderd.com/nix-darwin/manual/index.html#sec-options
• Home-Manager configuration options (for stuff contained in the roles/home-manager folder): https://nix-community.github.io/home-manager/options.html

Note: The way this repository is built, any Nix-Darwin settings you want shared or to be re-used between your outputs should go in the roles folder and any Nix-Darwin configuration settings that are specific to a single machine should go in its corresponding file in the hosts folder.

What is a Nix Flake and how does it work?

A Nix flake is a self-contained Nix configuration. In this case, we're building Nix-Darwin configurations, which allow a user to configure MacOS.

The flake.nix file consists of two parts, inputs and outputs. Inputs are resources that will be utilized by the outputs. Outputs are build targets -- in this case, our outputs are MacOS builds. This Flake is designed with the intention that each MacOS you manage should have its own output.

The anatomy of this Flake

Inputs

Inputs are resources that will be utilized by the build. In this Flake, we're using the following external resources to build the configuration for the machine:

• nixpkgs for Nix packages: https://github.com/nixos/nixpkgs
• nix-darwin for managing MacOS: https://github.com/LnL7/nix-darwin
• home-manager for managing various configurations, such as Firefox preferences and plugins: https://github.com/nix-community/home-manager
• nur for downloading community packages, specifically for downloading Firefox plugins: https://github.com/nix-community/NUR

This snippet shows all of the inputs in the Flake:

...
  inputs = {
    nixpkgs.url = "github:nixos/nixpkgs/nixpkgs-unstable";
    darwin.url = "github:LnL7/nix-darwin/master";
    darwin.inputs.nixpkgs.follows = "nixpkgs";
    home-manager = {
      url = "github:nix-community/home-manager";
      inputs.nixpkgs.follows = "nixpkgs";
    };
    nur.url = "github:nix-community/NUR";
  };
...

Outputs (build targets)

Each MacOS build is an output in flake.nix. This repository comes with two outputs/MacOS builds:

• m2-macbook-air: an example build for settings required for an M2 Macbook Air
• intel-macbook: an example build for settings required for an Intel Macbook

Each output/MacOS build has a corresponding file in ./hosts where configurations should be imported from the ./roles directory. Any specific configuration for a particular machine should live in its file in the ./hosts directory.

This snippet from flake.nix shows the Flake's output named m2-macbook-air and its corresponding config file ./hosts/m2-macbook-air.nix being imported:

  ...
  outputs = inputs@{ self, nixpkgs, darwin, home-manager, jovian-nixos, nur, ... }: {
    darwinConfigurations = {
      # m1-macbook 
      "m2-macbook-air" = darwin.lib.darwinSystem {
        system = "aarch64-darwin";
        specialArgs = inputs;
        modules = [ ./hosts/m2-macbook-air.nix ];
      };
  ...

In ./hosts/m2-macbook-air.nix, we can define which configurations we want to select from the [./roles](./roles) directory, for example:

...
  imports = [
    ../roles/m1.nix
    ../roles/defaults.nix
    ../roles/brew.nix
    ../roles/yabai.nix
    ../roles/network.nix
    ../roles/home-manager/settings.nix
  ];
...

Roles:

Currently, the Flake contains the following example configurations that are in the ./roles directory (listed in no particular order):

• User settings: ./roles/users
• Configuring preferred MacOS settings: ./roles/defaults.nix
• Homebrew packages and settings: ./roles/brew.nix
• Some network settings: ./roles/network.nix
• Yabai and SKHD for tiling windows: ./roles/yabai.nix
• Some settings for M1/M2 devices: ./roles/m1.nix
• Home-Manager configurations: ./roles/home-manager