A nix module that arranges the macOS dock the way you want it. Note: It won't allow you to manually re-arrange the items on it; the dock gets reset everytime you log in.

dock.nix

{ config, pkgs, lib, ... }:
with lib;
let
  cfg = config.local.dock;
  stdenv = pkgs.stdenv;
in
{
  options = {
    local.dock.enable = mkOption {
      description = "Enable dock";
      default = stdenv.isDarwin;
      example = false;
    };

    local.dock.entries = mkOption
      {
        description = "Entries on the Dock";
        type = with types; listOf (submodule {
          options = {
            path = lib.mkOption { type = str; };
            section = lib.mkOption {
              type = str;
              default = "apps";
            };
            options = lib.mkOption {
              type = str;
              default = "";
            };
          };
        });
        readOnly = true;
      };
  };

  config =
    mkIf (cfg.enable)
      (
        let
          dockutil = (import ./dockutil.nix);
          du = "env PYTHONIOENCODING=utf-8 ${dockutil}/bin/dockutil";
          normalize = path: if hasSuffix ".app" path then path + "/" else path;
          entryURI = path: "file://" + (builtins.replaceStrings
            # TODO: This is entirely too naive and works only with the bundles that I have seen on my system so far:
            [" "   "!"   "\""  "#"   "$"   "%"   "&"   "'"   "("   ")"]
            ["%20" "%21" "%22" "%23" "%24" "%25" "%26" "%27" "%28" "%29"]
            (normalize path)
          );
          wantURIs = concatMapStrings
            (entry: "${entryURI entry.path}\n")
            cfg.entries;
          createEntries = concatMapStrings
            (entry: "${du} --no-restart --add '${entry.path}' --section ${entry.section} ${entry.options}\n")
            cfg.entries;
        in
        {
          system.activationScripts.postUserActivation.text = ''
            echo >&2 "Setting up persistent dock items..."
            haveURIs="$(${du} --list | ${pkgs.coreutils}/bin/cut -f2)"
            if ! diff -wu <(echo -n "$haveURIs") <(echo -n '${wantURIs}') >&2 ; then
              echo >&2 "Resetting Dock."
              ${du} --no-restart --remove all
              ${createEntries}
              killall Dock
            else
              echo >&2 "Dock is how we want it."
            fi
          '';
        }
      );
}

dockutil.nix

with (import <nixpkgs> { });
derivation {
  name = "dockutil-2.0.5";
  builder = "${bash}/bin/bash";
  args = [
    "-xeuc"
    ''
      ${unzip}/bin/unzip $src
      ${coreutils}/bin/mkdir -p $out/bin
      ${coreutils}/bin/mv dockutil-2.0.5/scripts/dockutil $out/bin/dockutil
    ''
  ];
  src = fetchurl {
    url = "https://github.com/kcrawford/dockutil/archive/2.0.5.zip";
    sha256 = "0b18awdaimf3gc4dhxx6lpivvx4li7j8kci648ssz39fwmbknlam";
  };
  system = builtins.currentSystem;
}

usage_example.nix

{ config, pkgs, ... }:
{
local.dock.entries = [
    { path = "${pkgs.emacs}/Applications/Emacs.app/"; }
    { path = "/Applications/Mailplane.app"; }
    { path = "/Applications/IRCCloud.app/"; }
    { path = "/Applications/Google Chrome.app/"; }
    { path = "/Applications/iPulse.app/"; }
    { path = "/Applications/Dash.app/"; }
    { path = "/System/Applications/Messages.app/"; }
    { path = "/Applications/iTerm.app/"; }
    { path = "/System/Applications/Music.app/"; }
    { path = "/System/Applications/Home.app/"; }

    # Folders:
    {
      path = "/Users/asf/Downloads/";
      section = "others";
      options = "--sort dateadded --view grid --display folder";
    }
    {
      path = "/Users/asf/Mess/Mess/";
      section = "others";
      options = "--sort name --view grid --display folder";
    }
  ];
}

    local.dock.username = mkOption {
      description = "Username to apply the dock settings to";
      type = types.str;
    };
  };

That's a good catch - you can use default = config.system.primaryUser; there, so you don't have to set that manually.

    local.dock.username = mkOption {
      description = "Username to apply the dock settings to";
      type = types.str;
    };
  };

That's a good catch - you can use default = config.system.primaryUser; there, so you don't have to set that manually.

Good point! Updated my Gist 👍