Locale and TOR Configuration Issues

Locale and TOR Configuration Issues

[julia.galaman--- via]

Hello everyone,

I have two issues. One is silly and the other is a bit less silly (I think). Please be patient with me, as I'm new and pretty terrified.

1) It's about the locale settings. So I am supposed to export the path to my locale as in the command given in the manual and hints, but when I try to give the path to any of the actual locales instead of just the locale directory or version, the console freezes and stays like that without any error message. Could you please tell me how this path should actually look?

2) As you know, both /gnu/store and /home/user/.guix-profile are mounted in read-only mode by default. I read that it is for safety. But the problem is that because by design all programs get installed in the 'local copies' of their normal directories (e.g. instead of /etc it's /home/user/.guix-profile/etc), all their config files automatically become read-only, even for superuser. In my case it was the torrc file, which has to be edited or else it won't work. I tried to force it and remount /gnu/store in read-write mode, then insert my edited torrc file, but after reboot all the changes disappeared. 

So logically speaking there has to be a way around it, like a piece of software that acts as a middleman for all the changes you want to make in /gnu/store, making it harder to screw up the system. There was a scrap of info in the manual about using guix-daemon to do this, but it was merely mentioned. It's really hard for me to understand the manual without broader context, so I might have misunderstood or omitted something. I would be really glad if someone found the time to explain to me why it works like that and how things get done here.

Thanks in advance.

Re: Locale and TOR Configuration Issues

[Leo Famulari]

On Tue, Jun 02, 2020 at 03:28:10PM +0200, julia.galaman--- via wrote:
> Hello everyone,
> 
> I have two issues. One is silly and the other is a bit less silly (I think). Please be patient with me, as I'm new and pretty terrified.

Welcome!

> 1) It's about the locale settings. So I am supposed to export the path to my locale as in the command given in the manual and hints, but when I try to give the path to any of the actual locales instead of just the locale directory or version, the console freezes and stays like that without any error message. Could you please tell me how this path should actually look?

If you are using Guix System, the locales should work automagically,
assuming you've filled out the locales field of config.scm and
reconfigured and rebooted since then:

https://guix.gnu.org/manual/en/html_node/Locales.html

If you are using Guix on another distro, then the environment variable
GUIX_LOCPATH should be set to the path of the locales, which for me is
'/home/leo/.guix-profile/lib/locale'. Actually choosing which locale to
use is controlled by the distro in this case, not Guix.

Does that help?

> 2) As you know, both /gnu/store and /home/user/.guix-profile are mounted in read-only mode by default. I read that it is for safety. But the problem is that because by design all programs get installed in the 'local copies' of their normal directories (e.g. instead of /etc it's /home/user/.guix-profile/etc), all their config files automatically become read-only, even for superuser. In my case it was the torrc file, which has to be edited or else it won't work. I tried to force it and remount /gnu/store in read-write mode, then insert my edited torrc file, but after reboot all the changes disappeared. 
> 
> So logically speaking there has to be a way around it, like a piece of software that acts as a middleman for all the changes you want to make in /gnu/store, making it harder to screw up the system. There was a scrap of info in the manual about using guix-daemon to do this, but it was merely mentioned. It's really hard for me to understand the manual without broader context, so I might have misunderstood or omitted something. I would be really glad if someone found the time to explain to me why it works like that and how things get done here.

Basically, the files should be copied out of
'/home/user/.guix-profile/etc' to '/etc', and then you will modify them
there.

Programs should either look in /etc by default, or it should be possible
to configure them to look in /etc. Otherwise, it's a bug in the Guix
packaging that we will have to fix.

If you find yourself wanting to edit files in /gnu/store, please ask for
advice because it can break your Guix installation. We actually make it
impossible when we can, like on Guix System.

Let us know how it goes!