Introduction

nix-hex-box is a nix-darwin module that configures an Apple container machine backed aarch64-linux remote builder for Nix.

The module is designed for Darwin hosts that want to offload Linux derivations to a local virtualized builder while keeping the host configuration declarative.

Current design highlights:

• installs Apple container from the official signed release package
• pulls the published Alpine/Lix-based builder image by default, with an optional local custom image build
• can optionally install Socktainer to expose a Docker-compatible local API socket
• configures nix.buildMachines for ssh-ng://container-builder
• manages durable state under ~/.local/state/hb
• wakes the builder machine on demand through SSH ProxyCommand
• keeps guest /nix persistent across machine stop/start cycles
• supports guest-side idle shutdown and recovery-oriented health checks

This book documents the module itself. If you use nix-hex-box from another repo, that repo should only need a high-level integration guide.