> Lower-level APIs are available to interact with the daemon and the > store. To instruct the daemon to perform a build action, users > actually provide it with a “derivation”. A derivation is a low-level > representation of the build actions to be taken, and the environment > in which they should occur—derivations are to package definitions what > assembly is to C programs. The term “derivation” comes from the fact > that build results _derive_ from them.
This paragraph explains well what derivations are. But, it only helps a bit with the rather confusing etymology of the word. "derive" and "derivation" raise very familiar mathematical notions in our mind, that it may not be possible to really explain our use of "derivation" very easily.
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