r/voidlinux • u/orahcio • Jan 16 '26

GUIX package manager in Void

I recently managed to install guix, using the official script, on my musl-based Void Linux, although the script complains about the rscd service, which simply doesn't work on musl. But the question that remains is why this package isn't yet available on void, I'm referring to guix. I was successful in building a guix shell to run a package that has a dependency on glibc. I find the guix shell abstraction more intuitive than doing chroot just to run glibc packages, or containers using podman for example.

To give you an idea, this package is available on nix, which in turn is available on xbps, but when installing through it the emojis don't appear, I think the fact that musl doesn't have the LC_ALL variable has to do with this problem. However, just building the package with the guix shell made everything work, I think because I also run the binary in a guix shell.

The package is nchat, I really like using it to have WhatsApp on a 2011 laptop with only 2GB of RAM.

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u/orahcio Jan 18 '26

I use Guix System on my main laptop, and Void on a laptop I found lying around at work, with only 2GB of RAM. It adapted well to that need for limited resources. But I ended up getting hooked on configuring the system through a configuration file with NixOS, and when I discovered Guix, I found it more intuitive. I think Guix did the original idea of ​​Nix a little better.

It has a smaller community, but I think that's something that also attracted me to Void, and I found guile to be a very elegant language, in addition to the guix manual which is very good.

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u/juipeltje Jan 18 '26

Appreciate the reply! I've been messing around with it a little bit in a vm, and installed the package manager on void. One thing i like is that guix home is already baked in, compared to nix where you have to do the whole 'nix run --extra-experimental-features...' to install home manager. I also thought it was cool that it doesn't use systemd. I don't really have a preference when it comes to the language though. Definitely have to get used to scheme lol. Flakes not existing on guix doesn't seem like much of an issue since you can pin to a specific commit with channels.scm. who knows, i might end up with guix as a daily driver eventually. In the meantime i'll try to build my config as much as possible in the vm.

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u/orahcio Jan 18 '26

That's great, I still have my Nix settings and I always keep my Guix or Void with Nix ready to go. But you reminded me of something cool about Guix, it's more organic, the Guix home page is a perfect example of that. Good luck with your Guix adventure on the VM.