Re: What is Guix garbage collector root aka gc root

[Ricardo Wurmus]

Hi Oleg,

> 2. I need to build a package, but don't install it.  Just preserve it
> for offloading.  Is “guix build --root=$HOME/.guix-profile PACKAGE” (run
> as non root user) what I want?  Or if not, what FILE in “--root=FILE” do
> I need to pass?

You can pass any file to “--root”.  It will *create* a GC root for you.

The manual says this:

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
‘--root=FILE’
‘-r FILE’
     Make FILE a symlink to the profile for this environment, and
     register it as a garbage collector root.

     This is useful if you want to protect your environment from garbage
     collection, to make it “persistent”.

     When this option is omitted, the environment is protected from
     garbage collection only for the duration of the ‘guix environment’
     session.  This means that next time you recreate the same
     environment, you could have to rebuild or re-download packages.
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

Since it will create a new symlink, do *not* give it the path to an
existing profile.

--
Ricardo

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