nix-store is not added to the global PATH by default, blocking remote deployments

[Francisco-Andre-Martins]

Describe the bug

By default, only the nix-daemon is added to the PATH, which means that the rebuild fails with the following error

[2026-01-28T19:24:38Z INFO  system_manager_engine::register] Running nix build...
[2026-01-28T19:24:38Z INFO  system_manager_engine::register] Built system-manager profile /nix/store/k02n11yvhilwsvl5845i09lplm87ii1a-system-manager
[2026-01-28T19:24:38Z INFO  system_manager] Copying closure to target host...
bash: line 1: nix-store: command not found
error: cannot connect to 'my.host.com'
[2026-01-28T19:24:38Z ERROR system_manager] Error copying closure, exit status: 1

To Reproduce

Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Install the nix package manager on the target host
2. Attempt to deploy a system configuration via

sudo nix run 'github:numtide/system-manager' -- --target-host root@my.host.com switch --flake .#my-host
[sudo] password for myuser: 

I am using openSuse Tumbleweed.

After creating a symlink with ln -s /nix/var/nix/profiles/default/bin/nix-store /usr/local/bin/nix-store the command works properly

Note: I am fully aware that this is an unsupported platform, and that this issue might be more adequate with upstream. Please do inform me if this is either platform specific or if it should be taken with upstream

[jfroche]

Thank you for your report.
Which nix installer did you use ? Which version of nix is installed ?

I am asking this because I fixed a similar problem in the nix nix-installer in NixOS/nix#14021

We are working on this new installer https://github.com/NixOS/nix-installer that you might want to try as well and should not have this problem.

[Francisco-Andre-Martins]

I used the default multiuser from here, installed on Monday. Nix version is nix (Nix) 2.33.1

[jfroche]

@Francisco-Andre-Martins can you try installing nix using the nix-installer here: https://github.com/NixOS/nix-installer (you might run the uninstall before running the install). The last version should fix the PATH problem for Suse.