Hi,

>> Questions:
>>
>> - Do manifests really need the store path?  
>> - Same question about propagated-inputs.  Aren't they already encoded in
>>   the package definition?  Why repeating them here?
>
> This ‘manifest’ file exists mostly for one purpose: to allow incremental
> operations on a profile with ‘guix upgrade’, ‘guix install’, and so on.
> If ‘--manifest’ were the only way to build a profile, this ‘manifest’
> file would (almost) not be needed.  (Actually it’s also needed for
> ‘--list-installed’.)

Makes sense.

So what's the take-away of this thread?

1. Simon suggested to add options to convert the manifest to the
user-friendly specification file (i.e. something compatible with the
--manifest option).

What about this instead: systematically generate this "specification"
file in every profile?  This way no need for extra command line options,
the work is already done for the user.  "To reproduce a profile" would
boil down to passing around this specification file.

2. On December 2, Simon mentioned Ludo's suggestion (from
https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/guix-devel/2019-11/msg00285.html)
that we added a "guix channel" subcommand for channel management.

Shall we open 2 bugs for these?

-- 
Pierre Neidhardt
https://ambrevar.xyz/