# Release 22.11 (“Raccoon”, 2022.11/30) {#sec-release-22.11}

The NixOS release team is happy to announce a new version of NixOS 22.11. NixOS is a Linux distribution, whose set of packages can also be used on other Linux systems and macOS.

This release is supported until the end of June 2023, handing over to NixOS 23.05.

To upgrade to the latest release follow the [upgrade chapter](#sec-upgrading).

## Highlights {#sec-release-22.11-highlights}

In addition to numerous new and upgraded packages, this release includes the following highlights:

- Software that uses the `crypt` password hashing API is now using the implementation provided by [`libxcrypt`](https://github.com/besser82/libxcrypt) instead of glibc's, which enables support for more secure algorithms.
  - Support for algorithms that `libxcrypt` [does not consider strong](https://github.com/besser82/libxcrypt/blob/v4.4.28/lib/hashes.conf#L41) are **deprecated** as of this release, and will be removed in NixOS 23.05.
  - This includes system login passwords. Given this, we **strongly encourage** all users to update their system passwords, as you will be unable to login if password hashes are not migrated by the time their support is removed.
    - When using `users.users.<name>.hashedPassword` to configure user passwords, run `mkpasswd`, and use the yescrypt hash that is provided as the new value.
    - On the other hand, for interactively configured user passwords, re-set the passwords for all users with `passwd`.
    - This release introduces warnings for the use of deprecated hash algorithms for both methods of configuring passwords. To make sure you migrated correctly, run `nixos-rebuild switch`.

- The NixOS documentation is now generated from markdown. While docbook is still part of the documentation build process, it's a big step towards the full migration.

- `aarch64-linux` is now included in the `nixos-22.11` and `nixos-22.11-small` channels. This means that when those channel update, both `x86_64-linux` and `aarch64-linux` will be available in the binary cache.

- `aarch64-linux` ISOs are now available on the [downloads page](https://nixos.org/download.html).

- `nsncd` is now available as a replacement of `nscd`.

  `nscd` is responsible for resolving hostnames, users and more in NixOS and has been a long standing source of bugs, such as sporadic network freezes.

  More context in this [issue](https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/issues/135888).

  Help us test the new implementation by setting `services.nscd.enableNsncd` to `true`.

  We plan to use `nsncd` by default in NixOS 23.05.

- Linode cloud images are now supported by importing `${modulesPath}/virtualisation/linode-image.nix` and accessing `system.build.linodeImage` on the output.

- `hardware.nvidia` has a new option, `hardware.nvidia.open`, that can be used to enable the usage of NVIDIA's open-source kernel driver. Note that the driver's support for GeForce and Workstation GPUs is still alpha quality, see [the release announcement](https://developer.nvidia.com/blog/nvidia-releases-open-source-gpu-kernel-modules/) for more information.

- The `emacs` package now makes use of native compilation which means:
  - Emacs packages from Nixpkgs, builtin or not, will do native compilation ahead of time so you can enjoy the benefit of native compilation without compiling them on you machine;
  - Emacs packages from somewhere else, e.g. `package-install`, will perform asynchronously deferred native compilation. If you do not want this, maybe to avoid CPU consumption for compilation, you can use `(setq native-comp-deferred-compilation nil)` to disable it while still benefiting from native compilation for packages from Nixpkgs.

## Internal changes {#sec-release-22.11-internal}

- Haskell `ghcWithPackages` is now up to 15 times faster to evaluate, thanks to changing `lib.closePropagation` from a quadratic to linear complexity. Please see backward incompatibilities notes below. <https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/pull/194391>