branch master updated: doc: Add Guix Days 2020 notes on "The Perfect Setup".

[Pierre Neidhardt]

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     new 4b2000a  doc: Add Guix Days 2020 notes on "The Perfect Setup".
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commit 4b2000ad12111e146ab43db2cdcac0b7805d763a
Author: Pierre Neidhardt <address@hidden>
AuthorDate: Mon Feb 17 11:59:17 2020 +0100

    doc: Add Guix Days 2020 notes on "The Perfect Setup".
    
    * doc/guix-days-2020/perfect-setup.org: New file.
---
 doc/guix-days-2020/perfect-setup.org | 149 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 1 file changed, 149 insertions(+)

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+* The Perfect Setup
+
+The manual mentions a "Perfect Setup" which is a rather pompous title
+considering the many shortcomings it currently has! :)
+
+Let's list the main pain points below and some suggestions on how to fix them.
+
+** Too Emacsy
+
+Most tools for hacking Guix imply the use of Emacs.  Even Guile-Studio is Emacs
+under the hood.  This is the source of a few problems:
+
+- Emacs has a steep learning curve which may overwhelm newcomers and thus deter
+  Guix adoption.
+
+- Non-Emacs users may want to stick to their favourite editor.
+
+We need to work on integrating Guix with Vim, etc.
+
+** Emacs-guix.el does not work with channels
+
+https://github.com/alezost/guix.el/issues/34
+
+** Recommended Emacs packages
+
+We could add this to The Perfect Setup:
+
+- Magit
+
+- Yasnippet to automate the redaction of commit message.
+  Add this to your Emacs config:
+
+  #+begin_src elisp
+  (when (require 'yasnippet nil 'noerror)
+    (yas-global-mode 1)
+    (add-to-list 'yas-snippet-dirs
+                 (expand-file-name "etc/snippets" "~/projects/guix")))
+  #+end_src
+
+- guix.el
+  Try the development commands as well as the log modes.
+
+- Helm / Ivy with =imenu= (fixed in Emacs 27) to browse package definitions
+  (fuzzy live search).
+
+  Fix for Emacs <27 here: https://github.com/alezost/emacs-config
+
+- engine-mode.el to browse the mailing lists from Emacs:
+
+  #+begin_src elisp
+(defun engine-eww-function (url &optional _)
+  (interactive)
+  (eww url))
+
+(defengine guix-devel
+  
"https://lists.gnu.org/archive/cgi-bin/namazu.cgi?idxname=guix-devel&submit=Search&query=%s";
+  :keybinding "gud"
+  :browser 'engine-eww-function)
+
+(defengine guix-help
+  
"https://lists.gnu.org/archive/cgi-bin/namazu.cgi?idxname=help-guix&submit=Search!&query=%s";
+  :keybinding "guh"
+  :browser 'engine-eww-function)
+  #+end_src
+
+- debbugs.el to browse and apply patches from Emacs.
+  Try =debbugs-gnu-bugs= to go to a given bug number directly.
+  Also try =debbugs-org= and the following snippet:
+
+  #+begin_src elisp
+(defun guix-debbugs-gnu (&optional severities packages archivedp suppress tags)
+  "Like `debbugs-gnu' but for the Guix project."
+  (interactive)
+  (let ((debbugs-gnu-default-packages '("guix-patches" "guix")))
+    (if (called-interactively-p)
+        (call-interactively 'debbugs-gnu)
+      (debbugs-gnu severities packages archivedp suppress tags))))
+  #+end_src
+
+  To apply patches, mark the corresponding emails then press press "|"
+  (gnus-summary-pipe-output) and type =cd ~/guix && git am= (change the path as
+  appropriate).
+
+- Geiser for Guile hacking.  You need to tell Emacs to add the checkouts of 
Guix
+  and the channels that you use in order to load hack a Guix-related module 
from
+  the REPL.
+
+  #+begin_src elisp
+  (dolist (dir '("~/projects/guix" "~/projects/my-guix-channel"))
+    (when (file-directory-p dir)
+      (add-to-list 'geiser-guile-load-path dir)))
+  #+end_src
+
+  Geiser needs more work, in particular:
+
+  https://gitlab.com/jaor/geiser/issues/293
+  https://gitlab.com/jaor/geiser/issues/294
+  https://gitlab.com/jaor/geiser/issues/295
+  https://gitlab.com/jaor/geiser/issues/296
+
+  Something that many Guix hackers didn't seem to know: on error you can 
display
+  the backtrace with all local values for all the frames with
+
+  #+begin_src scheme
+  ,backtrace #:full? #t
+  #+end_src
+
+  or
+
+  #+begin_src scheme
+  ,bt #:full? #t
+  #+end_src
+
+  It's cumbersome to write though and it would be nicer to implement
+  https://gitlab.com/jaor/geiser/issues/295.
+
+- Paredit, Parinfer, Lispy, symex
+
+  While =paredit= is the most famous package for enhanced Lisp editing, the
+  other ones might be more modern and worth checking out.
+  For instance, have a look at the demos for Lisp:
+
+  https://github.com/abo-abo/lispy#demos
+
+** Configuration sharing hub
+
+We don't really have a way of sharing Guix tips and configurations.
+
+For now, all we have is
+
+- https://old.reddit.com/r/GUIX/
+- https://gitlab.com/explore/projects?tag=guix
+- https://github.com/topics/guix
+
+** use-package.el Guix support
+
+Currently Emacs' use-package.el installs from MELPA / ELPA when a package is
+missing.
+It would be nice to add a Guix backend so that the package is automatically
+installed to the given profile when missing.
+
+** Other considerations
+
+Some remarks came up that are not directly related to the tooling.
+
+*** Channel origin of a package
+
+Currently there is no practical way to know from which channel a package comes.
+We would need to add another field to =guix show= and =guix search=.