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rgoulter | karma 3152 | avg karma 2.28 · 2023-08-22 21:06:05

The nix PhD is titled "The Purely Functional Software Deployment Model", which suggests that deployment was very much in mind with Nix. https://edolstra.github.io/pubs/phd-thesis.pdf

RyEgswuCsn | karma 616 | avg karma 2.77 · 2023-08-23 04:18:42

That is very interesting. Skimming through the thesis, I find it fascinating introductory material to Nix. And you are correct, Nix started as a deployment tool. Although I'd argue in an era (1978!) when software are mostly distributed as source, reliable deployment largely implies reliable building from source.

Macha | karma 17779 | avg karma 3.43 · 2023-08-23 19:00:38

1978 is not the publish date of the thesis. The examples (Firefox, JDK 5, OpenSSL 0.9.7) should give away that it's newer, and also the most recent citation is from 2006. I'm not sure why the title page has a 1978 as I can't read Dutch. Google Translate indicates it might be a date of birth of the author, but that's a weird thing for the title page.