---
sidebar_position: 1
description: Turn an empty folder into something magical.
---

# First Steps

:::tip

If you fuck around with documentation, you don't have to do any hard stuff.

:::

## Setting up the repo

### Create a project

Start by running `init-nix raw lifetracker`. This uses my `init-nix` script to initialize a folder in `~/Documents/Code/lifetracker` containing a `.envrc` file and a bare-bones `flake.nix`.

For posterity (aka, to test Docusaurus code highlighting, since this is very much IN the repo), here's the flake.nix with key lines highlighted:

```nix title="~/Documents/Code/lifetracker/flake.nix"
{
  description = "Lifetracker Monorepo";

  inputs.nixpkgs.url = "github:NixOS/nixpkgs/nixpkgs-unstable";
  inputs.flake-utils.url = "github:numtide/flake-utils";

  outputs = { self, nixpkgs, flake-utils }:
    flake-utils.lib.eachDefaultSystem (system:
      let
        inherit (pkgs.lib) optional optionals;
        pkgs = import nixpkgs { inherit system; };


      in
      with pkgs;
      {
        devShell = pkgs.mkShell {
          buildInputs = [
            bashInteractive
            glibcLocales
            git
            emacs-nox
            // highlight-start
            nodejs
            pnpm
            // highlight-end
          ] ++ optional stdenv.isLinux inotify-tools
          ++ optional stdenv.isDarwin terminal-notifier
          ++ optionals stdenv.isDarwin (with darwin.apple_sdk.frameworks; [
            CoreFoundation
            CoreServices
          ]);
        };
      });
}
```

### Monorepo with pnpm and turbo

In the new directory, run `npx create turbo@latest`. If you're in the future trying this, yes, you'll realize it wants to make a subdirectory and complains about existing files, so you'll have to end up deleting everything, using the npx script, and then re-initializing the nix flake directory. Annoying, but manageable.

At this point, you have a pretty decent starting point. Looking at the files, you'll see references to `@lifetracker` that will need to be changed. Also, nothing will work and you'll get annoying messages until you run `pnpm install`. You'd think the error messages would hint at this, but you'd be dead wrong.

:::warning

I just made this point, but look, a warning box telling you to run `pnpm install`!

:::

## Baby's First Steps

This is the part where I ripped out the Next.js guts from the `docs` folder and replaced it with Docusaurus. I gotta admit, it's an incredibly satisfying static site generator.

Am I now wasting my time writing documentation and pretending it's productive? Sure. But, you know, good documentation is a gift, they say.

### Adding Docusaurus

So, how do you actually add Docusaurus to a fresh newly-generated Turbo app? Of course, this isn't the most straightforward either. I renamed `docs` to `docs.old`, renamed its `package.json` to `package.json.old` (so that the `pnpm-workspace.yaml` doesn't try to load shit from the old docs folder), then ran

```
npx create-docusaurus@latest docs classic
```

from the `apps` directory. This created a new `apps/docs` subdirectory with a Docusaurus, uh... install, I guess.

After another `pnpm install`, and then editing the name, version, dependencies, and scripts (I just renamed "start" to "dev" so that `pnpm run dev` starts Docusaurus) --- we're good to go!