(No provocation)
I see these reasons:
- newbie
- lazy (don’t wanna edit config files etc.)
- unique features (like assistant/toolbox, some optimizations like in cachyos)
- wanna check how different systems are set up (that’s rather distrohopping)
Personally, I used manjaro i3 when I was beigginer and wanted to see how tiling WM should be configured (check out ranger config, for example). But after some time, I don’t see reasons why not to just customize pure arch (same with debian and debian-based distros).
Yeah it’s great. I tried DMS and Noctalia very briefly before settling on Noctalia. They’re very similar in purpose and functionality I would say. Mess around with the settings and see what your vibe is and what your gut tells you, is what I would say. Very much down to preference. Best of luck!
I’m on nixOS, I wonder if I can easily swap DMS/Noctalia in/out via the flakes, to check the differences myself. I feel an evening or weekend project coming up :D Thanks for the tip!
This is why I’m not on nix 😆 I just install and run, takes 2 minutes. Don’t like it, uninstall and uncomment the old line back. Should be 15 minutes for the whole thing lol. I hope fiddling with nix is something you enjoy though. 😁 All the best!
I switched to nix not too long ago, and I must say, it’s been a smooth experience. I can’t imagine removing DMS to install the other one via apt or pacman would be safe for the niri config. NixOS could give me a clean separation. And if it doesn’t work, the rollback is easy, with 0 impact on my niri or DMS configs. My days of adventure are over I guess :)
Oh no, the Niri keyboard shortcuts for Noctalia would definitely not work if you removed it, or if you aren’t running it. 😄 And vice versa for DMS.
That’s the beauty of Niri’s include directive, that you can include different config files depending on which environment you are in. Very handy.
I have one for Noctalia bindings e.g.
I guess if you are used to nix already and can work efficiently with it, it’s a net gain of plus minus zero. I guess that’s why I don’t use it. I have to learn something fairly complicated in order to be able to do something I can already do equally efficiently. 😅
hmm those configs get added to the nix files, not sure how I leverage that include directive in such an environment. Should be fun to find out!
NixOS wasn’t that bad. I’m not that familiar with the nitty-gritty of Linux so yes it was tough the first days. Setting up everything just right, recreating the Sway layout from before. Still, once that works, it’s smooth sailing. I’ve not yet had the misfortune of having to do a reinstall, perhaps I’ll reconsider then 🤣
Hopefully you have all your nix configs backed up somewhere? 😅
Ah yeah, I’m guessing you don’t? I don’t really know anything about nix yet so I don’t understand how it can combine keyboard shortcuts for different shells and Niri into one Niri config other than if you add them manually. I feel like keyboard shortcuts are a very personal thing.
Especially it you’re running a custom keyboard like me with Colemak-DH layout. Then the default keyboard shortcuts will most likely not be great. 😅
yea they’re in a git repo, one of the benefits of doing this
I don’t think it will be a matter of combining, more of commenting out one import while uncommenting the other (I hope 😆)
Different shortcuts, so custom setups for everything hmm. I don’t think NixOS has much if any advantage here :)
Have you been doing Colemak for long? I’ve always wanted to get off this qwerty, but the brief stint over at dvorak wasn’t too great. But I’ve since pushed through learning vim … somewhat, seems a similar wall of frustration. I might be up for another challenge.
Why did you choose Colemak?
Nice! I’ve been meaning to set up chezmoi for my config files for a while. Need to get around to that.
Oooh my, yeah let’s get into keyboard layouts! 😃 I’ve been using Colemak-DH for a little over a year, since I got my ZSA Voyager keyboard.
I was on QWERTY since childhood before that, and was typing at about 117 words per minute before the switch. I decided I was going to use a new layout immediately when starting to use the Voyager because I figured I’d just dive into the deep end. I had been researching layouts for a while before that, following legends such as Ben Vallack on YouTube, and his journey with custom keyboards. It seems like Colemak-DH is a popular and modern choice for split keyboards, among custom keyboard users. So I picked that. But really I just wanted to get off of QWERTY.
Now, I set up the Voyager to have that layout, but not only did it now have a new layout I’m not used to, it also is a split keyboard, and a column-staggered keyboard, so three major things I’m not used to.
I went from 117 WPM to about… 20. It was brutal. Answering people with simple messages on Slack took minutes. I felt like I had to apologize and explain to people why it was so slow chatting with me. 😆 I trained hard and now I’m up to like 80. But it’ll probably be another lifetime until I’m ever up to the same speed, if ever.
The ergonomics are worth it though. The split keyboard opens up the chest and shoulders a lot and the hands and fingers are much more aligned with the arms and chair arm rests. Well worth the money and effort for me as a person who works with computers 8h a day.
The ergonomics of keyboard shortcuts for a looot of TUI software suffers a bit though. The HJKL home row is not… in a row, with Colemak. That takes a while to get used to. You could of course set up a keyboard layer where those keys are in line, or change the shortcuts in all your software config files. 😅 I chose just to accept the slower speed and get used to the new location of the keys. 🤷♂️ Coding isn’t about speed. The thought process is the slowest part of coding. 👍
I hope that answers your question and then some. 😅