Nix Devshell Helpers

Helper scripts and templates for Nix development shells.

Quick Start

Copy flake.example.nix to your project as flake.nix and run nix develop.

PHP-FPM

Manages PHP-FPM lifecycle in development shells with automatic socket configuration.

Scripts

• php-fpm/start-php-fpm.sh - Starts PHP-FPM
• php-fpm/stop-php-fpm.sh - Stops PHP-FPM and cleans up
• php-fpm/add-php-fpm-handler-to-htaccess.sh - Configures Apache .htaccess
• php-fpm/remove-php-fpm-handler-from-htaccess.sh - Removes .htaccess configuration

Configuration

Required:

• PROJECT_HTACCESS_PATH - Path to .htaccess (only if using htaccess scripts)

Optional (auto-detected with sensible defaults):

• PHP_FPM_BIN - Path to php-fpm binary (defaults to php-fpm in PATH)
• PHP_FPM_POOL_NAME - Pool name (defaults to current directory name)
• PHP_FPM_RUNTIME_DIR - Runtime directory (defaults to $XDG_RUNTIME_DIR/<pool-name> on Linux, $TMPDIR/<pool-name> on macOS, or /tmp/<pool-name> as fallback)
• PHP_FPM_SOCKET_PATH - Socket path (defaults to $PHP_FPM_RUNTIME_DIR/php-fpm.sock)

Features

• Auto-detection: Sensible defaults for pool name, runtime directory, and socket path
• Mailpit integration: Automatically configures sendmail_path if mailpit is available in PATH
• Per-directory configuration: Supports .user.ini files for overriding PHP settings per project (instant updates in dev mode)
• Cross-platform: Uses $XDG_RUNTIME_DIR on Linux, $TMPDIR on macOS, with /tmp fallback
• Graceful cleanup: Kills orphaned processes and removes runtime directories on exit

Usage

{
  inputs = {
    nixpkgs.url = "github:NixOS/nixpkgs/nixos-unstable";
    nix-devshell-helpers = {
      url = "github:timohubois/nix-devshell-helpers";
      flake = false;
    };
  };

  outputs = { nixpkgs, nix-devshell-helpers, ... }: let
    system = "x86_64-linux";
    pkgs = nixpkgs.legacyPackages.${system};
  in {
    devShells.${system}.default = pkgs.mkShell {
      packages = [ pkgs.php83 ];

      shellHook = ''
        # PHP-FPM (explicitly set PHP version, recommended for reproducibility)
        export PHP_FPM_BIN="${pkgs.php83}/bin/php-fpm"

        source ${nix-devshell-helpers}/php-fpm/start-php-fpm.sh

        cleanup() {
          source ${nix-devshell-helpers}/php-fpm/stop-php-fpm.sh
        }
        trap cleanup EXIT
      '';
    };
  };
}