getting tensorflow to work on aarch64-linux

I’m trying to get TensorFlow to work inside a Nix-based environment on an aarch64-linux system by using mach-nix.

I created a flake for this, which works fine on x86_64-linux but cannot resolve all of its dependencies on aarch64-linux. I’m not sure how to best deal with those missing dependencies and I was hoping someone can point me in the right direction.

The specific system I am trying this on is a Jetson Nano running Nvidia’s Ubuntu-based distro.

I have created a repo with a minimal testcase for running TensorFlow here: https://github.com/mschwaig/tensorflow-hello-world-nix-flake.

This works on x86_64-linux and builds properly runnable thing, but on aarch64-linux both nix build and nix develop fail like this:

mschwaig@mschwaig-lamb:~/tensorflow-hello-world-nix-flake$ nix build  
warning: unknown setting 'experimental-features'
builder for '/nix/store/vfrbnxpz9zwzllhrp96zjngz6681wlr9-python3.8-google-auth-1.24.0.drv' failed with exit code 1; last 10 log lines:
  installing
  Executing pipInstallPhase
  /build/google-auth-1.24.0/dist /build/google-auth-1.24.0
  Processing ./google_auth-1.24.0-py2.py3-none-any.whl
  Requirement already satisfied: rsa<5,>=3.1.4 in /nix/store/zfhs95j11lardkrmdnzdga2k804j0d7s-python3.8-rsa-4.6/lib/python3.8/site-packages (from google-auth==1.24.0) (4.6)
  Requirement already satisfied: setuptools>=40.3.0 in /nix/store/a3npn2p0l2xpmsmcc8lnihr3kaipzws9-python3.8-setuptools-50.3.1/lib/python3.8/site-packages (from google-auth==1.24.0) (50.3.1.post0)
  Requirement already satisfied: cachetools<5.0,>=2.0.0 in /nix/store/dridwi27k9r0wk89kxj9jw8ffm06lcpb-python3.8-cachetools-4.2.1/lib/python3.8/site-packages (from google-auth==1.24.0) (4.2.1)
  Requirement already satisfied: pyasn1-modules>=0.2.1 in /nix/store/dp3lp9c61qbnr11v1zwqq24sszxrbisi-python3.8-pyasn1-modules-0.2.8/lib/python3.8/site-packages (from google-auth==1.24.0) (0.2.8)
  ERROR: Could not find a version that satisfies the requirement six>=1.9.0 (from google-auth)
  ERROR: No matching distribution found for six>=1.9.0
cannot build derivation '/nix/store/a8dwz3kbczp5j0rfvkj9rmfc4km159xa-python3-3.8.7-env.drv': 1 dependencies couldn't be built
cannot build derivation '/nix/store/rv7rlh52q4bz8k3p34jbr19ra12fy168-python3.8-google-auth-oauthlib-0.4.2.drv': 1 dependencies couldn't be built
cannot build derivation '/nix/store/c97sk5wlzkxxagdhnvzk9vdrrsb250v5-python3.8-tensorflow-tensorboard-2.4.0.drv': 1 dependencies couldn't be built
cannot build derivation '/nix/store/6x9pd7v6zxpwy2ahx7h1li2arxq5mgz3-tensorflow-2.4.0.drv': 1 dependencies couldn't be built
cannot build derivation '/nix/store/jyk69capr5j8pn74d3jwgvdi598d7g7a-python3.8-tensorflow-2.4.0.drv': 1 dependencies couldn't be built
cannot build derivation '/nix/store/li75irpidlfl9dml8f2j86z0r7gvdbk6-python3.8-tensorflow-hello-world-0.1.0.drv': 1 dependencies couldn't be built
error: --- Error ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- nix
build of '/nix/store/li75irpidlfl9dml8f2j86z0r7gvdbk6-python3.8-tensorflow-hello-world-0.1.0.drv' failed
mschwaig@mschwaig-lamb:~/tensorflow-hello-world-nix-flake$

[mschwaig]

Since https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/pull/117004 was merged, to staging and then eventually to master, the test project in my repo is building now. It takes quite some time to build tensorflow for aarch64-linux though. I have not checked again if I can get a binary artifact from some provider.

I think this can be closed now so I’m doing that. Thanks for your help @DavHau.

[DavHau]

Hey, I’m not quite sure yet why the six dependency gets lost. (I will have a deeper look). But there is a simple workaround you can do. Just add six >= 1.9.0 to your requirements and add it as a dependency to google auth via override:

mach-nix.mkPython {
  ...
  _.google-auth.propagatedBuildInputs.mod = pySelf: _: oldVal: oldVal ++ [ pySelf.six ];
}