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Yeah, problem with nix is that it's different. The nix language is a lazy-functional DSL, which takes a bit of effort to learn.

The thing is, "better" does imply "different." The syntax is weird and difficult, but it's the linchpin of the whole system. It's much, much better than your typical packaging system and worth the effort to learn it.

If you like Scheme, GNU Guix is based on Nix but uses a DSL in Guile.

http://www.gnu.org/software/guix/

Do you wish nix's syntax were more like jinja? Or do you actually want to use jinja with nix somehow? I don't really know what the latter would mean, since nix is a programming language and jinja is a (string-based) template system.