From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
From: ison <ison@airmail.cc>
Subject: Re: Building and installing packages with modifications
Date: Sun, 24 Feb 2019 11:46:20 -0700
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Since this hasn't received any replies I'll give my solution, although I
apologize in advance if this isn't the "best" way to do it.

When I want to modify a package that I install via "guix package -i" (as opposed
to using the GuixSD system configuration) I just create a new file for each such
package that inherits the default package and then override any options I need.
For example, in the case of curl you could make a file with the contents:
--------------------
(use-modules ((guix licences) #:prefix license:)
              (gnu packages)
              (gnu packages curl)
              (guix packages)
              (guix utils)))

(package
  (inherit curl)
  (substitute-keyword-arguments (package-arguments curl)
    ((#:tests? #f #f)
      #f)))
--------------------
which will just inherit curl and only modify the flag "tests?" to disable tests.
Everything else will be kept the same. Then if you save that to a file called
my-curl.scm you could install it to your guix profile with
"guix package -f my-curl.scm"