2025-11-06

New Linux setup, who this?

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This is a more readable and opinionated version of my Linux setup logbook. Where the former describes the journey, this post only has the results.

New Linux setup, who this?

When setting up a new rice, there are three separate modules that interchangeably sit on top of each other.

  • Linux system

  • DE/WM and all the graphical elements like GTK-Theme, icons, statusbar, ..

  • The terminal emulator and shell tools

Base Linux

Arch, obviously. Manjaro, to be more specific. Why? Because I prefer the stable updates instead of a rolling package model. Maybe I am too old, but I prefer something that just works, has batteries included and doesn't crash over the bleeding edge. #philosophy

Things left to do

  • disk encryption setup (LUKS?)

## GUI layer

The WM, statusbar, icons, theme and all non-terminal/GUI applications.

Window Manager (WM)

Niri, where have you been all my life? Imo, the current holy grail of window management on a Linux laptop. Infinite scrolling columns make my 15 Inch laptop appear way bigger than it is.

Things to improve the default niri setup with:

  • Some way of easy window management, because I get lost in not-yet-closed windows.

    • niriswitcher, nirius

  • I wish for a way to designate tags and then jump to the tagged window, similar how I have designated workspaces on sway that I can jump to

  • parallax :)

Statusbar

Quickshell/Noctalia. Batteries included, easy install. It works, it is responsive, It has IPC to easily set hotkeys, it looks amazing.

Things to improve

  • Nothing

Theme

Juno-Filelight for the theme, and Papirus-Dark for icons. My favorite DotA2 wallpaper (TODO link to wallpaper)

Things to improve

  • I wish I knew how to set a system-wide cursor :(

  • I'd like to have a more sane way to manage the theme. I edited around 5 config files and then also needed to install gnome-tweaks, lxappearance and kvantummanager to set everything. Hey, at least it works and looks like a unified design now :)

File Manager

Nemo as file manager. I prefer it over PcManFM, which I used for quite a long time.

  • Needed to run a random command to set the open-with-terminal terminal correctly

Launcher

Fuzzel. I tried anyrun and walker aswell, but they were either ugly, didn't run or were diffcult to configure. Or all of them :)

  • I combine fuzzel -d with rofimoji as emoji and unicode selector

  • I added .desktop files for my internal websites and dashboards, e.g. to directly launch the GUI of Synology, Syncthing, Pi-Hole or router

Image Viewer

Lightningview as default image viewer. Very fast. Nothing special.

Oculante as featureful image viewer.

  • I don't like the UI theme, but no idea how to change it. Maybe disable the window decorations?

Document Viewer

TODO PDF zathura? Document Viewer?

Calibre for ebook management. Self-explanatory for everyone who reads.

  • I use a Kobo BW reader with Plato as reader application. I don't recommend the default Kobo, but Plato is amazing.

Shell layer

Terminal

Shell