Delete your setup README.

One command in. flox activate out.

Point it at a repo you already have. It reads what is there, pins it, and proves the environment starts before it says it is done.

macOS and Linux. Prefer Homebrew? Other ways

Then, in the repo you already have

Or just say it: Get this repo running with Flox.

Run these from a clone of flox/flox-skills.

Then, in the repo you already have

Codex loads the skill from what you ask. There is no command to type.

Cursor, Copilot, Windsurf, Gemini and more, through skills.sh. Third party, needs Node.

Then, in the repo you already have

Your agent loads the skill from what you ask. There is no command to type.

No repo handy? Use ours.

Bring your own agent.

Claude CodeCodexCursorCopilotWindsurfGemini

Ask git what it did.

One new directory appears, and not one tracked file is touched. Nothing is called done until the environment has started and your interpreters have run inside it.

files written, all under .flox/

tracked files modified

lines deleted, anywhere

0.19s

to re-enter the environment

checkout-serviceafter /floxify

$ git status
On branch main
Untracked files:
  (use "git add <file>..." to include in what will be committed)
	.flox/
 
nothing added to commit but untracked files present

checkout-servicestaged

$ git add -A && git diff --cached --stat
 .flox/.gitattributes    |   1 +
 .flox/.gitignore        |   5 +
 .flox/env.json          |   4 +
 .flox/env/manifest.lock | 437 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 .flox/env/manifest.toml |  26 ++
 5 files changed, 473 insertions(+)

.flox/env/manifest.toml5 sections, nothing else

[install]: what to install, pinned
[vars]: environment variables the project reads
[hook]: runs on entry, so the database exists before you need it
[services]: what flox starts and supervises
[options]: which machines this environment can serve

See the details

[install]

go.pkg-path = "go"
postgresql.pkg-path = "postgresql_16"
redis.pkg-path = "redis"

[vars]

PGPORT = "5432"
PGDATABASE = "checkout"
REDIS_PORT = "6379"

[hook]

export PGDATA="$FLOX_ENV_CACHE/pg"
[ -d "$PGDATA" ] || initdb -D "$PGDATA" ...

[services]

postgres   postgres -D ... -p "$PGPORT"
redis      redis-server --port "$REDIS_PORT"

[options]

systems = ["x86_64-linux", "aarch64-linux", "aarch64-darwin"]

Read from the checkout-service run above. Agent packages (flox/claude-code, flox/codex) are real catalog entries you can add, not part of that manifest.

What flox activate gets you.

The toolchain, the databases and the environment variables all come with it.

No Docker

Databases start with it

and stop when you leave

$ flox activate --start-services -c "flox services status"
NAME       STATUS       PID
postgres   Running    36881
redis      Running    36883
$ pg_isready -h /tmp -p 5432
/tmp:5432 - accepting connections
$ redis-cli -p 6379 ping
PONG

No installs

Already on your PATH

go: go (1.26.4)
postgresql: postgresql_16 (16.14)
redis: redis (8.8.0)

No onboarding doc

Everyone else just clones

$ git clone ...
$ flox activate
that is the whole setup

FAQ

Does this touch my existing setup?

No. It writes 5 files inside .flox/ and nothing anywhere else. Your devbox.json, Brewfile, .devcontainer/ and flake.nix keep working exactly as they do now, and nothing that git already tracks is edited. If you hate the result, the directory is the whole footprint.

What does it actually read to decide?

The pin files you already keep: .python-version, .nvmrc, go.mod, rust-toolchain.toml and their equivalents. It also converts what other tools left behind, so devbox.json, .devcontainer/, a Brewfile, and asdf or mise pins all become manifest entries rather than being ignored. Anything it cannot pin from a file in the repo, it says so rather than guessing quietly.

Which stacks does it handle?

Runtimes: Python, Node, Ruby, Go, Rust, PHP, Elixir, .NET, Deno and Bun. Package managers: uv, Poetry, npm, pnpm, Yarn, Bundler, Cargo, Composer and Mix, whichever one the repo already uses. The package manager runs on activation, so a clone is one command away from running. Ruby with native gems is the case most likely to need a hand afterwards.

What happens to my docker-compose stack?

It stays yours. PostgreSQL, Redis, MySQL, MariaDB and MongoDB can become managed Flox services that start and stop with the environment, but a docker-compose, Tilt or Sentry devservices topology is handed back to its own orchestrator instead of being half-translated.

Does it replace pip, npm, cargo or bundler?

No. Flox manages runtimes, system libraries and databases, which is the layer your package manager assumes is already there. Your package manager still runs, inside the environment, from the on-activate hook.

What if my repo already uses Flox?

It switches to audit mode and reports gaps instead of overwriting. An existing manifest is never modified, so running it on a repo someone else already set up is safe and tells you what is missing.

Do I commit .flox/?

Yes, that is the point of it. Committed, the next person clones and runs flox activate and is done. Uncommitted, you have solved the problem for exactly one machine.

How do I undo it?

Delete the directory. The skill offers that as an option when it finishes, and it runs rm -rf .flox/. There is no other state to clean up, nothing registered globally and nothing to uninstall.

Does it work on Linux?

Yes. The installer in step 01 detects your platform and installs the .pkg on macOS, the .deb on Debian and Ubuntu, and the .rpm on Fedora and RHEL. It stops rather than touching an existing Flox or Nix install.

floxify reads your repo and resolves against a live catalog, so it can be wrong. A clean verify means consistent with the files it read, not that it is correct. Ruby with native gems and polyglot monorepos are the hard cases. Read the manifest before you commit it.

Others already deleted theirs.

Their setup README, steps, caveats and all.

PostHog — Michael Matloka, Senior Product Engineer

Resolve AI — Amin Karbas, Member of Technical Staff

Same problem, same fix: NVIDIA, D.E. Shaw, Arcesium, Neo4j, Weaviate, Detaso.