Default docker example doesn't work

[ctron]

Introduce your stance

I want to build a nix package using docker/podman.

Describe the issue

The documentation at https://nixos.org/download/#nix-install-docker says:

$ git clone --depth=1 https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs.git
$ docker run -it -v $(pwd)/nixpkgs:/nixpkgs nixos/nix
docker> nix-build -I nixpkgs=/nixpkgs -A hello
docker> find ./result # this symlink points to the build package

However, that results in:

bash-5.2# nix-build -I nixpkgs=/nixpkgs -A hello
error: path '/default.nix' does not exist

I have no idea how to resolve this.

Page links

• https://nixos.org/download/#nix-install-docker

Additional context Add any other context about the problem here.

• [ ] I already created a Pull Request

[nat-418]

Yeah the docker-compose stuff didn't work for me either:

 $ docker-compose up
[+] Building 0.1s (2/2) FINISHED                                      docker:default
 => [nixos-homepage internal] load .dockerignore                                0.0s
 => => transferring context: 2B                                                 0.0s
 => [nixos-homepage internal] load build definition from Dockerfile             0.0s
 => => transferring dockerfile: 2B                                              0.0s
failed to solve: failed to read dockerfile: open /var/lib/docker/tmp/buildkit-mount163813011/Dockerfile: no such file or directory

[mcdonc]

For the record, the fix is to change:

nix-build -I nixpkgs=/nixpkgs -A hello

To:

nix-build -I nixpkgs=/nixpkgs -A hello nixpkgs/default.nix

I'm not sure where in the nixpkgs repository to change this so the website isn't lies, though.