[bug#50960] [PATCH 00/10] Add 'guix shell' to subsume 'guix environment'

[Konrad Hinsen]

Hi everyone,

I just discovered this discussion today... a lot to read...

First of all, I very much like this proposal. It provides many
improvements to today's "guix environment" for which I have immediate
use cases.

Looking at the proposal and then the discussion, I wonder if the main
issue with "guix shell" is that it's two very different things wrapped
into one:

  1) A convenience utility for interactive work, in particular software
     development, implemented as "guix shell" with no arguments.

  2) A modernized "guix environment" for both interactive and scripting
     use.

The behavior of "guix shell" with and without arguments is sufficiently
different, which will make it a challenge to document, and then a
challenge for users to understand. And part of the criticism related to
the tacit execution of files is about the convenience for 1) vs. the
risk in 2).

So... how about making this two different commands? They could of course
share most of the implementation.

I'd use "guix shell" for the scenario that actually starts a shell, and
something different, perhaps "guix process", for the infrastructure
command for use in scripts.

Cheers,
  Konrad