Refactor: Structured Configuration Support for Home Manager Module by ananyatimalsina · Pull Request #667 · mangowm/mango

ananyatimalsina · 2026-02-15T11:52:58Z

Summary

This PR refactors the home-manager module to use structured Nix attribute sets instead of raw text configuration, following the architectural pattern from Hyprland's NixOS module.

All credit for this design goes to the Hyprland project. This is a 1:1 adaptation of their implementation, modified for mangowc's specific syntax requirements.

Motivation

The previous implementation required users to write raw config strings:

settings = ''
  blur=1
  border_radius=6
  bind=SUPER,Q,spawn,wezterm
'';

This approach had several limitations:

No type checking or validation at build time
Poor editor support (no completion or syntax highlighting)
String escaping issues
Difficult to compose or merge configurations
Error-prone for complex configs

New Configuration Format

settings = {
  # Simple key-value pairs
  blur = 1;
  border_radius = 6;
  
  # Nested attributes (flattened with underscores)
  blur_params = {
    radius = 5;
    num_passes = 2;
  };
  # Becomes: blur_params_radius=5, blur_params_num_passes=2
  
  # Lists for duplicate keys
  bind = [
    "SUPER,r,reload_config"
     "Alt,space,spawn,rofi -show drun"
     "Alt,Return,spawn,foot"
  ];
  tagrule = [
     "id:1,layout_name:tile"
     "id:2,layout_name:scroller"
  ];
};

Backward Compatibility

⚠️ Breaking Change: This changes the settings option from raw text to structured attributes.

Migration path: Users need to convert their configs from:

settings = ''
  blur=1
  bind=SUPER,Q,spawn,wezterm
'';

To:

settings = {
  blur = 1;
  bind = [ "SUPER,Q,spawn,wezterm" ];
};

For users who need raw text during migration, the new extraConfig option is available:

extraConfig = ''
  # Raw config lines
  special_option = 1
'';

Testing

Syntax validated with nix-instantiate --parse
Verified toMango function generates correct output format
Tested list expansion for duplicate keys
Tested nested attribute flattening with underscores
Confirmed automatic exec-once for autostart.sh
Tested for my own personal config and system

Credits

This implementation is based entirely on Hyprland's NixOS module architecture:

Original implementation: https://github.com/hyprwm/Hyprland/blob/main/nix/hm-module.nix
Hyprland lib helpers: https://github.com/hyprwm/Hyprland/blob/main/nix/lib.nix

All architectural credit goes to the Hyprland development team. This PR simply adapts their excellent design to mangowc's specific syntax and requirements.

Convert settings from raw text to structured Nix attrs, following Hyprland's module pattern. Implementation based 1:1 on Hyprland's design - all credit to the Hyprland project. - Add nix/lib.nix with toMango conversion function - Support nested attrs, lists for duplicate keys - Add extraConfig, topPrefixes, bottomPrefixes options - Auto-add exec-once for autostart.sh Adapted for mangowc syntax (underscore separators vs colons).

Tomate0613 · 2026-02-15T12:47:06Z

How does this work for keymodes?

ananyatimalsina · 2026-02-15T13:07:51Z

Oversight on my part, thanks for pointing that out! It should work now with the new keymode syntax being:

settings = {
  bind = [
    "ALT,R,setkeymode,resize"  # Enter resize mode
  ];
  
  # Keymodes (submaps) for modal keybindings
  keymode = {
    resize = {
      bind = [
        "NONE,Left,resizewin,-10,0"
        "NONE,Escape,setkeymode,default"
      ];
    };
  };
};

invra · 2026-02-17T09:03:31Z

Could we possibly implement a check for the old config and show an evaluation warning, so there can possibly be a buffering period? Some people might just want to update mango, but refactor their expression at a later date. I think builtins.isString can be all that's really needed.

ananyatimalsina · 2026-02-17T09:13:38Z

Done

invra · 2026-02-17T09:19:52Z

Alright, cool!

Yappaholic · 2026-02-22T11:18:50Z

Looks good to me, but

I think it needs more testing before going upstream and
PR commits can be squashed into one commit for clarity

Tomate0613 · 2026-02-25T13:57:11Z

I think its also worth validating the config, like I do in #655

invra · 2026-02-25T15:10:46Z

I think its also worth validating the config

I think that would be not easy to maintain, because of the config specs do change a bit, whilst mkOption will be the way, we need a spec with a script which generates the nix, using said spec, which wont work nicely, unless we also refactor parts of the config system on mango which make it work together, but that's a burden.

Tomate0613 · 2026-02-25T18:56:12Z

I don't quite understand what you mean by that?
I think just validating the output using mango -c is good enough

invra · 2026-02-26T18:55:53Z

nevemind then, i wasnt aware -c existed, nor could do that

Uses `pkgs.runCommand` in the home-manager module to parse and validate the generated config file prior to deployment, preventing broken setups.

ananyatimalsina · 2026-03-01T14:41:25Z

I think its also worth validating the config, like I do in #655

Done, pretty much a copy paste of your approach thx a lot

SamuelHDieterich · 2026-03-01T20:06:13Z

Sorry if this is just considered noise for the PR, but thanks, @ananyatimalsina, for putting this together!

I've been looking to migrate from Hyprland to MangoWC and I had some mixed feelings when most of the configs were similar, but the home-manager settings was expecting a raw string. I just pulled your flake, and it is working as I would've expected.

Just giving my thumbs up that this is great deal for someone like me that was expecting a more nix-friendly home-manager configuration.

Yappaholic · 2026-03-01T22:24:52Z

Sorry if this is just considered noise for the PR, but thanks, @ananyatimalsina, for putting this together!

I've been looking to migrate from Hyprland to MangoWC and I had some mixed feelings when most of the configs were similar, but the home-manager settings was expecting a raw string. I just pulled your flake, and it is working as I would've expected.

Just giving my thumbs up that this is great deal for someone like me that was expecting a more nix-friendly home-manager configuration.

Definitely not a noise, user testing is appreciated

SamuelHDieterich

Although the restructure settings has been working great, my systemd services were not been correctly initialized. After digging a bit, I found that if I manually added the dbus command to the autostart_sh config, things would work as expected.

wayland.windowManager.mango = {
  enable = true;
  systemd = {
    enable = true;
    variables = [ "--all" ];
  };
  autostart_sh = "dbus-update-activation-environment --systemd --all"; # Extra line
};

I think the problem is easy to solve. You have prepended this command to the autostart_sh variable defined in the let in block, but still using the value from cfg.autostart_sh to create the file and add the exec-once command to mango.conf.

Can you review if these changes make sense?

nix/hm-modules.nix

ananyatimalsina added 2 commits February 15, 2026 12:35

Merge branch 'main' of github.com:ananyatimalsina/mangowc

04456ad

feat(nix): add keymode support for modal keybindings

3eb9fe7

feat(nix): support old config format with deprecation warning

c9a93a3

Merge branch 'DreamMaoMao:main' into main

9d19f2b

DreamMaoMao force-pushed the main branch 4 times, most recently from dc016eb to 6b2d694 Compare February 22, 2026 03:52

ananyatimalsina added 3 commits February 26, 2026 21:32

Merge branch 'DreamMaoMao:main' into main

126a378

Merge branch 'mangowm:main' into main

5396ec1

feat(nix): add build-time configuration validation

1f8f4cc

Uses `pkgs.runCommand` in the home-manager module to parse and validate the generated config file prior to deployment, preventing broken setups.

SamuelHDieterich reviewed Mar 2, 2026

View reviewed changes

nix/hm-modules.nix Show resolved Hide resolved

nix/hm-modules.nix Show resolved Hide resolved

Merge branch 'mangowm:main' into main

0931581

DreamMaoMao force-pushed the main branch 3 times, most recently from 673ec40 to db30977 Compare March 9, 2026 05:28

DreamMaoMao force-pushed the main branch 2 times, most recently from 17ff2ad to 064bcad Compare March 23, 2026 02:56

Conversation

ananyatimalsina commented Feb 15, 2026

Summary

Motivation

New Configuration Format

Backward Compatibility

Testing

Credits

Related

Uh oh!

Tomate0613 commented Feb 15, 2026

Uh oh!

ananyatimalsina commented Feb 15, 2026

Uh oh!

invra commented Feb 17, 2026

Uh oh!

ananyatimalsina commented Feb 17, 2026

Uh oh!

invra commented Feb 17, 2026

Uh oh!

Yappaholic commented Feb 22, 2026

Uh oh!

Tomate0613 commented Feb 25, 2026

Uh oh!

invra commented Feb 25, 2026

Uh oh!

Tomate0613 commented Feb 25, 2026

Uh oh!

invra commented Feb 26, 2026

Uh oh!

ananyatimalsina commented Mar 1, 2026

Uh oh!

SamuelHDieterich commented Mar 1, 2026

Uh oh!

Yappaholic commented Mar 1, 2026

Uh oh!

SamuelHDieterich left a comment • edited Loading Uh oh! There was an error while loading. Please reload this page.

Uh oh!

Choose a reason for hiding this comment

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Uh oh!

Reviewers

Assignees

Labels

Projects

Milestone

Development

Uh oh!

5 participants

SamuelHDieterich left a comment •

edited

Loading