Linux

I've recently switched over to NixOS in gradual rollouts to my systems:

Stage 0 (~2h):

• Installed NixOS with Gnome on my Laptop for testing an getting a feel for it (I prefer testing on bare-metal initially)
• Tweaked it a bit via the config: removed gnome apps that came with the preset, installed all programs I needed and tested them

Stage 1 (~3d):

• Installed NixOS minimal on my primary system
• Set up sway according to the wiki
• Bodged together something similar to my previous arch setup, mostly my linking old config files with nix to programs installed with nix

Stage 2 (~4d):

• Moved all configs I could from my linked config files to the nix module declarations
• Seperated config file into files ordered as like config-tree
• Achieved a similar working state to my previous arch install
• Moved channel from 22.11 to unstable (rolling release)

Stage 3 (~7d):

• Set up home-manager
• Finally moved all config declarations into nix modules, no non-nix files left in my config
• Also copied the config to my laptop, a single activation and I switched from gnome to sway without any problems

Stage 4 (~21d):

• Looked at a bunch of other peoples system configs
• Recreated everything as a flake, similar to dunklecat's config from sourcehut
• Applied the config to my primay system and laptop
• Wrote a bunch more config modules

Stage 4.5:

• Wrote some tools to make moving around nix easier for me, but mostly to get accustomed to the ecosystem

Stage 5 (~6d):

• Created and applied further system configs for a hetzner server & VMs

Stage 6 (tbd):

• Refining my config
• Adding further modules

Edit 1 (added personal experience): I'm a computer science student and have been using *nix as a daily driver for half a decade, my previous daily driver was arch for about two years. I spend ~1000h/y coding on non-University or Work related projects. I'm at a point where I can typically pick up a the basics of a new language in two to three weeks and write simple programs with it -> library/specific knowledge comes with usage.