Installing IFM on nixOS Latest

IFM (Interactive File Manager) is an open-source web-based file manager that can be used to manage files and directories on a remote server. In this tutorial, we will guide you through the process of installing IFM on nixOS Latest.

Prerequisites

Step 1: Install git

IFM is not available in the nixOS package repository, so we will install it from GitHub. Git is required to download and install the IFM code.

Use the following command to install git:

sudo nix-env -i git

Step 2: Clone IFM repository from GitHub

Now that git is installed, we will clone the IFM repository from GitHub using the following command:

git clone https://github.com/misterunknown/ifm.git

This will create a directory called "ifm" in your home directory.

Step 3: Install IFM dependencies

IFM has a few dependencies that need to be installed before it can be used.

Use the following command to install these dependencies:

nix-shell -p nodejs yarnpkg

Note that this command will install yarnpkg and nodejs for the current user only.

Step 4: Compile IFM

Now that we have all the dependencies installed, we can compile IFM using the following commands:

cd ifm
npm install
npm run build

This will download and install all the required packages and compile IFM. This process may take some time.

Step 5: Run IFM

After compiling IFM, we can now run it using the following command:

npm run start

This will start IFM on port 3000. You can access IFM by navigating to http://localhost:3000 on your web browser.

Step 6: Setup IFM as a service (optional)

If you want to run IFM as a service, you can create a systemd service file using the following command:

sudo nano /etc/systemd/system/ifm.service

Then copy and paste the below content into the file and save it:

[Unit]
Description=IFM file manager
After=network.target

[Service]
User=<your_username>
ExecStart=/home/<your_username>/ifm/node_modules/.bin/pm2 start /home/<your_username>/ifm/index.js
Restart=always
KillSignal=SIGQUIT
SyslogIdentifier=IFM

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Make sure to replace <your_username> with your actual username.

Now, reload systemd and start the IFM service:

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable ifm.service
sudo systemctl start ifm.service

IFM will now run as a service on your server.

Conclusion

In this tutorial, we have learned how to install and run IFM on nixOS Latest. IFM is a powerful tool that can be used to manage files and directories on a remote server.

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