From "What's Guix?" to Full-time Guix Geek (Guix Days 2022 Talk)

Just over 6 months ago I had never heard of GNU Guix or knew what it was, and now I'm submitting patches and enjoy hacking on my Guix system constantly (and spending too much time on IRC). In this talk I will answer how I got here, what my experiences have been, and what I've learned as a newbie to not-quite-a-newbie. I have been a Linux user for many years, from Debian in the early 32bit to 64bit era, to compiling kernels for a Gentoo media box, and more recently Arch as my full-time distro on 3 computers (yes, insert Arch meme). But now all I want is Guix on everything. Along the way I had to learn what Guix is, how to use it, and how to hack on it. There are clear highlights like being able to use Scheme everywhere and the cleanliness of a declarative, atomic system, but also rough spots in a still growing distro and community, like adapting to mailing lists, patch review, and the Guix way. I hope my perspectives will be interesting for other newcomers to learn from, as well as th