| 21 Sep 2023 |
 Pol | I will when I introduce the Nix tool. First I need to introduce the concept of "Reproducibility". | 09:49:09 |
| Pol | Nix is "just" a tool that helps, just like docker is. | 09:49:20 |
 Matthias Meschede | A misunderstanding that I have sometimes seen is that Reproducibility becomes so much the center point of the discussion that it seems like a weird obsession to people with an outside perspective on software. | 09:49:47 |
| Matthias Meschede | They care about reducing cost and protecting themselves against ransomware. | 09:50:16 |
| Pol | In reply to @matto153:matrix.org
They care about reducing cost and protecting themselves against ransomware. this is definitely one of the outcome of reproducibility. I will insist on this in the document. | 09:51:10 |
| Matthias Meschede | If they understand that the lack of reproducibility is a major cause for this, in my experience the rest of the conversation becomes much easier. | 09:51:32 |
| Pol | Nice. | 09:52:44 |
 tomberek | Matthias Meschede: there is another related concept I've been thinking about that might be a better description of what Nix helps with. It is about allowing as much variance in the situation as possible and reducing the variance of the outcome. "Reproducibility" is often meant to mean that there is no variance in output. Nix allows me to change quite a few things in the environment safely. And even when I want a variance in output, that variance is limited and controlled For example; I want to patch something, I know that only that patch changed, no other change leaked in, and that the outcome should only vary due to the result of my introduced change. | 13:43:48 |
| tomberek | Reproduciblity in spite of changes in the environment. Resiliance? From the thesis: "This thesis is about getting computer programs from one machine to another—and having
them still work when they get there." You change the environment, but still expect a consistency in behavior. | 13:48:29 |
| Matthias Meschede | tomberek: I thought a lot about exactly this as well. In the scientific community this is referred to as reproducibility and replicability. Unfortunately the definition is exactly the other way around as in the Nix world. Replicability refers to the ability to exactly reproduce something, whereas reproducibility refers to the ability to achieve consistent results (under some variation). Replicability as Nix gives is weaker than reproducibility in this sense, an if you want a truly robust, i.e. generalizing, result you want to be able to modify things. | 16:49:06 |
| Matthias Meschede | That Reproducibility alone is not the killer feature is also clear if you consider every close off binary blog as reproducible. And that's unfortunately a very common misunderstanding. | 16:51:42 |
| Matthias Meschede | * That Reproducibility alone is not the killer feature is also clear if you consider every closed off binary blog as reproducible. And that's unfortunately a very common misunderstanding. | 16:51:50 |
| Matthias Meschede | well, maybe replicability would be bit-by-bit reproducibility and Nix still is mostly reproducible because it lowers variance to a point that we get consistently working packages. | 16:53:18 |
| Matthias Meschede | * That Reproducibility alone is not the killer feature is also clear if you consider every closed off binary blob as reproducible. And that's unfortunately a very common misunderstanding. | 16:54:50 |
 garbas | jonge: avocadoom: Just FYI, everything that lands on main branch is published here -> https://main--nixos-homepage.netlify.app | 19:59:30 |
| garbas | avocadoom: Did you create a list of components we can start working on? you can add them to the description of the https://github.com/NixOS/nixos-homepage/issues/1125 | 20:00:32 |
| garbas | I'm currently working on those asciinema bits (since I know probably them most about it), jonge If you don't have anything to work on just pick some element (maybe something from the landing page) and announce it in this room. | 20:03:35 |
|  dedmunwalk joined the room. | 23:04:28 |
| 22 Sep 2023 |
|  Bryan Honof changed their profile picture. | 22:22:25 |
| 23 Sep 2023 |
|  Ben Ford joined the room. | 22:59:29 |
| 24 Sep 2023 |
|  mib 🥐 changed their profile picture. | 12:20:15 |
| 25 Sep 2023 |
 avocadoom | Just a quick notice, I'm currently busy studying for an exam, so this is why there is not much progress from my side atm | 18:07:49 |
| avocadoom | After this or next Thursday things will be better again | 18:08:09 |
| garbas | In reply to @avocadoom:avocadoom.de
Just a quick notice, I'm currently busy studying for an exam, so this is why there is not much progress from my side atm Good luck with the exam and let us not bother you until then :) | 18:44:15 |
|  maka-77x joined the room. | 23:23:40 |
| 26 Sep 2023 |
 jonge | In reply to @garbas:matrix.org
I'm currently working on those asciinema bits (since I know probably them most about it), jonge If you don't have anything to work on just pick some element (maybe something from the landing page) and announce it in this room. i would have a few hours this week where i can contribute. however, i am not sure where to start from now. we have the header and footer and what else could be done and how was left a bit less detailed in the last meeting because that was considered the next step. or did i just forget and we have more details written down somewhere? | 12:04:38 |
 @theophane:hufschmitt.net | 👋🏻 marketers. I've started working on getting us a stand at FOSDEM. Tracking issue here | 16:35:53 |
| @theophane:hufschmitt.net | If anyone is interested, help is welcome :)
I've started filling in the application form (here) but there's a bunch of things left (well all the non-trivial bits). And there's a channel for the organisation at https://matrix.to/#/!dnbnxSrmSGfZRBckrM:matrix.org | 16:39:37 |
| tomberek | We have a survey up for NixCon North America 2024: https://survey.nixos.org/346552
Please respond and share in other mediums to get more community input. | 22:08:22 |
| 27 Sep 2023 |
| mib 🥐 changed their display name from mib to mib 🥐. | 05:53:09 |
