Draft nix expression to wrap debian packages.

builder.sh

source $stdenv/setup
PATH=$dpkg/bin:$PATH

dpkg -x $src unpacked
cp -r unpacked/* $out/

debian-packages.nix

{ self, derive }: with self; {
hello = derive { name="hello-traditional"; version="2.9-2"; script="hello"; md5="f5f3c28b65221dae44dda6f242c23316"; };
}

default.nix

with import <nixpkgs> {};

# Draft nix expression to wrap debian packages.
# Written by Jeff Johnson based on r-modules.nix and this blog post:
# http://anderspapitto.com/posts/2015-02-28-deb-installation-nixos.html

# TODO: how to infer the "main/h" part of the url?
# TODO: sha256 instead of md5
# TODO: make deb2nix?
# TODO: multiple architectures
# TODO: can the script name be inferred? can you have more than one?
# TODO: include a list of dependencies in the packages desc

let
  self = import ./debian-packages.nix { inherit self; derive = mkDebianPackage; };
  mkDebianPackage = desc: let
    deb = mkPkg desc;
    mkUrl = { name, version}:
      "http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/pool/main/h/${name}/${name}_${version}_amd64.deb";
    mkPkg = pkg: stdenv.mkDerivation (pkg // {
      inherit dpkg;
      builder = ./builder.sh;
      runScript = "${pkg.script} $@";
      src = fetchurl {
        url = mkUrl { inherit (desc) name version; };
        inherit (desc) md5;
      };
    });
  in buildFHSUserEnv {
    inherit (deb) name runScript;
    targetPkgs = pkgs: [ deb ];
    multiPkgs = pkgs: [ pkgs.dpkg ];
  };
in self

Perfection