I'm been wanting to move over my main desktop for almost a year now. But from 3+ years of tinkering, installing applications, and configurations Ive been super hesitant. The jump from Ubuntu to NixOS would be a big one. I have a laptop running nixos thats given me some exposure to the nix language, but when it comes to my main rig, I still have the worry of "what if something I need wont be available?" and "what if I forget something?"

Well I finally tried home manager and wow, its the absolute perfect way to slowly transition to nixos. I'm slowly going through my package managers (cargo, npm, pip, apt, snap) and checking for applications that I can just drop into my home.nix. And every now and then I see an app I cant install (say, vtracer from cargo, very cool app). Well, I just make a mark and eventually I'll build my own derivation around it.

Home manager has been easing my worries as I make the transition. For those of you also unsure, I recommend integrating with home manager. You can do such small jumps at a time, no need to go full blown nix all at once.