couldn't install nix on top of broken nix

[christopherlam]

Describe the bug

Could not install nix on top of existing broken nix store.

Steps To Reproduce

Cannot recall exact steps: installed nix on top of ubuntu, installed home-manager. Set up home-manager. Somewhere in the home-manager manual suggests nix-env --uninstall '*' to clean up nix paths. I do this which uninstalls packages and nix and home-manager. Uh oh. No more nix. I call sh <(curl -L https://nixos.org/nix/install) --daemon to install nix again which leads to the failure as follows

Expected behavior

Nix installs successfully

Additional context

usermod: no changes
              Note:	Nix build user 28
   Logins Disabled:	Yes
  Member of nixbld:	Yes
    PrimaryGroupID:	30000

~~> Setting up the build user nixbld29

---- sudo execution ------------------------------------------------------------
I am executing:

    $ sudo useradd --home-dir /var/empty --comment Nix build user 29 --gid 30000 --groups nixbld --no-user-group --system --shell /sbin/nologin --uid 30029 --password ! nixbld29

Creating the Nix build user, nixbld29

           Created:	Yes
            Hidden:	Yes
    Home Directory:	/var/empty

---- sudo execution ------------------------------------------------------------
I am executing:

    $ sudo usermod --comment Nix build user 29 nixbld29

in order to give nixbld29 a useful comment

usermod: no changes
              Note:	Nix build user 29
   Logins Disabled:	Yes
  Member of nixbld:	Yes
    PrimaryGroupID:	30000

~~> Setting up the build user nixbld30

---- sudo execution ------------------------------------------------------------
I am executing:

    $ sudo useradd --home-dir /var/empty --comment Nix build user 30 --gid 30000 --groups nixbld --no-user-group --system --shell /sbin/nologin --uid 30030 --password ! nixbld30

Creating the Nix build user, nixbld30

           Created:	Yes
            Hidden:	Yes
    Home Directory:	/var/empty

---- sudo execution ------------------------------------------------------------
I am executing:

    $ sudo usermod --comment Nix build user 30 nixbld30

in order to give nixbld30 a useful comment

usermod: no changes
              Note:	Nix build user 30
   Logins Disabled:	Yes
  Member of nixbld:	Yes
    PrimaryGroupID:	30000

~~> Setting up the build user nixbld31

---- sudo execution ------------------------------------------------------------
I am executing:

    $ sudo useradd --home-dir /var/empty --comment Nix build user 31 --gid 30000 --groups nixbld --no-user-group --system --shell /sbin/nologin --uid 30031 --password ! nixbld31

Creating the Nix build user, nixbld31

           Created:	Yes
            Hidden:	Yes
    Home Directory:	/var/empty

---- sudo execution ------------------------------------------------------------
I am executing:

    $ sudo usermod --comment Nix build user 31 nixbld31

in order to give nixbld31 a useful comment

usermod: no changes
              Note:	Nix build user 31
   Logins Disabled:	Yes
  Member of nixbld:	Yes
    PrimaryGroupID:	30000

~~> Setting up the build user nixbld32

---- sudo execution ------------------------------------------------------------
I am executing:

    $ sudo useradd --home-dir /var/empty --comment Nix build user 32 --gid 30000 --groups nixbld --no-user-group --system --shell /sbin/nologin --uid 30032 --password ! nixbld32

Creating the Nix build user, nixbld32

           Created:	Yes
            Hidden:	Yes
    Home Directory:	/var/empty

---- sudo execution ------------------------------------------------------------
I am executing:

    $ sudo usermod --comment Nix build user 32 nixbld32

in order to give nixbld32 a useful comment

usermod: no changes
              Note:	Nix build user 32
   Logins Disabled:	Yes
  Member of nixbld:	Yes
    PrimaryGroupID:	30000

~~> Setting up the basic directory structure

---- sudo execution ------------------------------------------------------------
I am executing:

    $ sudo /bin/chown -R root:nixbld /nix

to take root ownership of existing Nix store files


---- sudo execution ------------------------------------------------------------
I am executing:

    $ sudo install -dv -m 0755 /nix /nix/var /nix/var/log /nix/var/log/nix /nix/var/log/nix/drvs /nix/var/nix /nix/var/nix/db /nix/var/nix/gcroots /nix/var/nix/profiles /nix/var/nix/temproots /nix/var/nix/userpool /nix/var/nix/gcroots/per-user /nix/var/nix/profiles/per-user

to make the basic directory structure of Nix (part 1)

install: creating directory '/nix/var/nix/userpool'

---- sudo execution ------------------------------------------------------------
I am executing:

    $ sudo install -dv -g nixbld -m 1775 /nix/store

to make the basic directory structure of Nix (part 2)


---- sudo execution ------------------------------------------------------------
I am executing:

    $ sudo install -dv -m 0555 /etc/nix

to place the default nix daemon configuration (part 1)

install: creating directory '/etc/nix'

---- sudo execution ------------------------------------------------------------
I am executing:

    $ sudo install -m 0664 /tmp/tmp.HYAxilCSSm/.nix-channels /root/.nix-channels

to set up the default system channel (part 1)


~~> Installing Nix

---- sudo execution ------------------------------------------------------------
I am executing:

    $ sudo cp -RLp ./store/10jzrky6qp59qm75zwxxjysyzphywznj-openssl-1.1.1l-bin ./store/1c1r48qa0m23vr9jy8sm0dc04vv14dak-coreutils-8.32 ./store/1kw32h97j6bbqcb2kl2nnaw57xnwyvcb-zstd-1.4.9 ./store/21iicqw6ib82qa1f1gfgppijz7sck8xj-aws-c-io-0.9.1 ./store/23wq9xncqncvxyddqpcb57f1qkgywdrr-aws-c-event-stream-0.2.7 ./store/433q5vd1ag3lg6chrm7pkqc78536l7pr-sqlite-3.35.5 ./store/4frnjf7jr2cc5k5wfqjapvszanmc8nq9-openssl-1.1.1l ./store/50msfhkz5wbyk8i78pjv3y9lxdrp7dlm-gcc-10.3.0-lib ./store/5d821pjgzb90lw4zbg6xwxs7llm335wr-libunistring-0.9.10 ./store/5p4jga61v4mg9pdrglj2hj76y5rbz02k-busybox-static-x86_64-unknown-linux-musl-1.32.1 ./store/5q2fwg0hhaw6n9j50snd6bn7r5rqr8y9-attr-2.4.48 ./store/5r0a92rsppim1dljzr0rhpxwdsmnab9l-libssh2-1.9.0 ./store/7lv2ahpd0x6zknyalr55mar2il2a3v0k-libsodium-1.0.18 ./store/7v7acyh2s8z2sajc1sijjs7a0svlwbyx-brotli-1.0.9-lib ./store/9pxjmchn68d0l78pcq3r54xdgaxpl83j-s2n-tls-1.0.0 ./store/ckb0qa2yrxrpp0piffgjq9id38gc5z9v-libidn2-2.3.1 ./store/dp18s34dnzbllx16cyb2pwz0fm19nbnf-bzip2-1.0.6.0.2 ./store/ds491f6b5pdk3xxnc2w103asyz1y4cfc-zlib-1.2.11 ./store/dvcalma5h3wd8bbwhj7g9m3yswxm707c-nss-cacert-3.66 ./store/fvb3znd0x7ijk0bqg3m1rndbzpspamrg-keyutils-1.6.3-lib ./store/hapw7q1fkjxvprnkcgw9ppczavg4daj2-nix-2.4 ./store/hh5ai1v2hhizkv5n4fr4hg72l1a5z1iw-curl-7.76.1 ./store/hi3dzzq1i54cpv259srcr99vh6lc4a65-openssl-1.1.1l-dev ./store/iz2jmn57crmp45y19bsj73bckj331jkq-xz-5.2.5 ./store/jbrdvdbanx81n7h4ij53mnb6v5qrc4h7-aws-checksums-0.1.11 ./store/jsfa5dnrrp1cl7yxkq8smgygg9fysgvk-aws-sdk-cpp-1.8.121 ./store/jsp3h3wpzc842j0rz61m5ly71ak6qgdn-glibc-2.32-54 ./store/l3hn1rpl7m5x45x1733x4n6wgdmn9pz0-editline-1.17.1 ./store/l4vm4han6vnnijhb6icmybbskq73ymj0-libxml2-2.9.12 ./store/lbc8s09msihzfrdfbsb7m3660hs05igp-libkrb5-1.18 ./store/mrv4y369nw6hg4pw8d9p9bfdxj9pjw0x-acl-2.3.0 ./store/n5vm0iv9jsxl0jbh8wh9l0sy8lb55z01-libarchive-3.5.2-lib ./store/n9va4cqy8r026jcjkxbnzhqbd33kl3nm-nghttp2-1.43.0-lib ./store/rsf0p5xifn2n5smg5v3l1sz75sv0maz2-libcpuid-0.5.1 ./store/vaal5xhgdn20qgjj58p9kdnqam8ppn6y-perl-5.32.1 ./store/w2wh0vxwk48fcdli04a38b4inbrj2qpz-aws-c-cal-0.4.5 ./store/wdja1fn6ldqzfy7ra9f072q34249dnd5-libseccomp-2.5.1-lib ./store/wv35g5lff84rray15zlzarcqi9fxzz84-bash-4.4-p23 ./store/yicaw4ql8dz3bvrpw1swxn3xwvr0afk3-aws-c-common-0.5.5 ./store/zr1jbxmlh4065a0njbhf471rk1xp9hxg-boehm-gc-8.0.4 /nix/store/

to copy the basic Nix files to the new store at /nix/store

cp: cannot overwrite non-directory '/nix/store/50msfhkz5wbyk8i78pjv3y9lxdrp7dlm-gcc-10.3.0-lib/lib64' with directory './store/50msfhkz5wbyk8i78pjv3y9lxdrp7dlm-gcc-10.3.0-lib/lib64'
cp: cannot overwrite non-directory '/nix/store/jsp3h3wpzc842j0rz61m5ly71ak6qgdn-glibc-2.32-54/lib64' with directory './store/jsp3h3wpzc842j0rz61m5ly71ak6qgdn-glibc-2.32-54/lib64'
cp: cannot overwrite non-directory '/nix/store/lbc8s09msihzfrdfbsb7m3660hs05igp-libkrb5-1.18/sbin' with directory './store/lbc8s09msihzfrdfbsb7m3660hs05igp-libkrb5-1.18/sbin'

---- oh no! --------------------------------------------------------------------
Jeeze, something went wrong. If you can take all the output and open
an issue, we'd love to fix the problem so nobody else has this issue.

:(

We'd love to help if you need it.

You can open an issue at https://github.com/nixos/nix/issues

Or feel free to contact the team:
 - Matrix: #nix:nixos.org
 - IRC: in #nixos on irc.libera.chat
 - twitter: @nixos_org
 - forum: https://discourse.nixos.org

[zot]

I deleted /nix and I was able to install it

[iFreilicht]

This issue can most likely be closed. The solution by @zot should work, and the installer was already updated so this specific problem cannot occur anymore in bb0c4b9.

[christopherlam]

Ok :)