This repository provides a small wrapper around nixos-anywhere to automate creation of NixOS VMs on MacOS hosts using UTM with the Apple virtualization backend (supporting Rosetta2).

Using the apple virtualsation (insted of qemu) provides access to Rosetta2 and thus efficient x86_64 support within the VM. Unfortunately, the utmctl does not yet provide full functionality (e.g. ip-address) for the appble backend. That complicates automatic vm creation and this repo provides utilities to automate as much as possible for a simple automation setup.

• create a nix flake with a nixosConfiguration defined
  • the ./example folder provides a flake with minimal example config
  • use it with nix flake new -t github:ciderale/nixos-utm my-utm-vm
  • adjust ./configuration.nix (atleast set your ssh public key)
• define an environment variable VM_NAME to name the UTM VM
  • maybe configure this env var within your project/system setup
• kickoff the installation process with the following command
  • assuming your flake is the current directory . with config utm

export VM_NAME=myVM
nix run github:ciderale/nixos-utm#nixosCreate .#utm

VM_NAME=myVM nix run github:ciderale/nixos-utm#nixosIP

This command uses the arp cache to lookup the ip address based on the mac address that is found in the VMs configuration folder.

VM_NAME=myVM nix run github:ciderale/nixos-utm#nixosDeploy .#utm

• Make VM configuration configurable (currently hardcoded in nixosCreate)
• Improve example configuration for simpler onboarding
• Provide utility to deploy an updated configuration
• Directory sharing between VM and host system.
  • it's a UTM system configuration, not a VM configuration
  • uses some binary coded "bookmark" format