NixCon 2025

Abstract:
When I first saw a colleague of mine typing "nix-shell", I had no idea what it did — but running it felt like magic. A swirl of "/nix/store/..." messages later, a fully working dev environment, with all the right tools and no system mess! Like Alice, I was “curiouser and curiouser.”

In this talk, I’ll share the key “aha!” moments from my first few weeks with Nix — how I came to understand derivations, the Nix store, and pure builds. I’ll walk through the “from confusion to clarity” moments that helped me go from feeling lost in a sea of unfamiliar terminology to confidently writing my first Nix expressions. Along the way, I’ll highlight the resources, metaphors, and mental models that made the biggest difference — and the ones that didn’t.

The Nix community is filled with passionate and experienced users, but for newcomers, the learning curve can feel overwhelming. This talk is not a tutorial, but a reflection: a newcomer’s perspective on what it’s like to learn Nix today, what helped me “get it,” and where the community can do more to support others on the same journey.

Target Audience:
- Beginners or those who are still wrapping their heads around Nix.
- More experienced users who want to improve the Nix learning experience will also benefit, as they’ll gain a fresh perspective on how to present these concepts.