Quick Start

Get tix running on an existing Nix project in under five minutes.

1. Install

The fastest way — no install required:

nix run github:JRMurr/tix -- inspect my-file.nix

For permanent use, add to your flake’s devShell or install with nix profile:

nix profile install github:JRMurr/tix

See Getting Started for all installation options.

2. Initialize your project

From your project root:

tix init

This scans your .nix files, classifies them (NixOS module, Home Manager module, callPackage, etc.), and writes a tix.toml with context sections, stub generation config, and [project] includes patterns for LSP background analysis. Preview first with tix init --dry-run.

3. Stub generation

For flake projects, tix init auto-detects your nixpkgs (and home-manager) inputs from flake.lock and adds a [stubs.generate] section. On first run, tix builds rich type stubs from your nixpkgs (~30-60s); subsequent runs are cached.

For non-flake projects, add the section manually:

[stubs.generate]
# any nix expression that resolves to a nixpkgs path
nixpkgs = { expr = "(<import pinned_nixpkgs>).path" }

See Configuration > Runtime stub generation for details.

4. Check your project

tix check

This type-checks every .nix file in your project, applying the contexts from tix.toml. Files are processed in dependency order so types flow across imports.

Or use the LSP for inline feedback in your editor:

tix lsp

See LSP for editor setup instructions.

5. Suppress false positives

Tix won’t understand everything — some files may produce errors you want to silence for now.

Suppress all diagnostics for a file:

# tix-nocheck
{ config, lib, pkgs, ... }:
{
  # nothing in this file is checked
}

Suppress a single line:

let
  # tix-ignore
  x = somethingTixDoesntUnderstand;
in
  x

See Configuration > Suppression directives for more.