Linux

cross-posted from: https://reddthat.com/post/35588255

TLDR: I want to be able to set specific window sizes and positions of the current window with hotkeys, as well as focus on specific apps with hotkeys, but I'm overwhelmed.

I've been trying to switch to Asahi Linux Fedora, and trying Gnome as my desktop environment since it can be customized with CSS, and with Wayland. I tried looking up how to change window layouts with hotkeys and it's confusing on what solution(s) I would end up wanting to use. Would I want to use a window manager?

Ultimate I want an alternative to Rectangle Pro app on Mac, which let's you set many hotketys for changing the current window's size & position: like use up the left or right halves or thirds of the screen, or corners and taking up a quarter of the screen. You can also make custom window layouts and bind those to keys.

I didn't find many results while looking up how to focus on specifc apps with hotkeys. For instance, I'd want to press CTRL Shift Z to switch specifically to Zen Browser or open it if it isn't opened, and CTRL Shift O to open or switch to Obsidian. I looked this up and didn't find options other than wmctrl or wlrctl. I tried the later: wlrctl window focus firefox, but got the error Foreign Toplevel Management interface not found!. on macOS there are many apps for this like BetterTouchTool & Hammerspoon.

I've been suggested to use a tiling window manager like Sway since it allows for controlling windows with hotkeys, but I'm having trouble getting started. I installed it in Fedora and tried logging back in with SwayFX (since it has features like blurring) but after I'm just shown a wallpaper with a top bar, the top left shows a 1 and the top right shows the time. I don't know what to do there. I tried looking up guides but didn't find anything, can you link me some if you know of any?

Hellwig is the maintainer of the DMA subsystem. Hellwig previously blocked rust bindings for DMA code, which in part resulted in Hector Martin from stepping down as a kernel maintainer and eventually Asahi Linux as a whole.

What makes Linux appealing to me is the extent of customizability, but I didn't find many answers when looking up with desktop environment is them most customizable. Some say KDE is most customizable than say, Gnome, but doesn't Gnome support CSS customization while KDE doesn't?

I think it's obvious (and has been) that the linux kernel needs more contributors and more maintainers to share the load*. The Linux Foundation spending 2% on kernel development in 2024 (page 18) does something but not nearly enough.

Is there a way that we as a community / third parties / non kernel devs can fund kernel developers and maybe even get a kernel maintainer in there? Maybe something already exists or do we have to start something ourselves?

*: Yes, I understand our overworked maintainer problem (being one of these people myself), but here we have people actually doing the work! - Greg KH

I started with mint more than 10 years ago because a friend of mine told me it was one, if not the best, distro for newbies (that was a fucking lie). Idk how mint is doing today but back then was kind of a mess and dealing with it wasnt easy, so i dont really know how or why i switched to debian for a while. With debian i had a lot of problems with some software, mostly proprietary drivers for esotic hardware i was running back then due to me buying the cheapest laptops available, so i started distro hopping for a while. Every distro but fedora was debian based so it felt a lot like a more of the same experience and I felt stuck in a loop where i was eventually gonna reinstall my whole system after breaking something i didnt even know existed.

Then one day i found arch. Installing it wasnt as easy as clicking install on the live system’s guy, but just by following the wiki general instructions i didnt have any issues the first time. It felt good. Building the system block by block helped me understand how things work, the package manager was the best i had seen and the newbie corner basically had the solutions for all my screw-ups, even more than ask-ubuntu did. Everybody in the community was super helpful (even some of the devs). Then there was the AUR, with almost every piece of esotic or proprietary software i needed, much easier than adding some random guy’s repositories to apt or enabling backports on debian. Also i found out that i prefer having a rolling release. With arch i learned how to use and maintain my system, and i just stuck with it.

That said, just how some use linux just to brag about it with their normie friends, many many people use arch to brag about it with other linux users (like my friend did), mostly beacause arch has the infamous reputation that it is hard to install, hard to maintain, easy to break. Which is actually not that bad considering that all these people are gonna end up posting in the newbie corner lol.

Truth is that arch is not harder than any other distro. It only comes down to your will to learn and RTFM What i think worked for me was the transparency. Nobody said it was as easy to use as windows, but nobody in the wiki said “dont do this unless you are an experienced user”. Arch is not another fork of ubuntu pretending to be “even more user friendly”, it’s just arch.

I think the problem is about distros like antergos (rip), manjaro, garuda, endevour trying to oversimplify something that only needs you to RTFM only ending up breaking something they tried to automate and hide behind a curtain that wasnt meant to be automated and was meant to be learned to manage, by hand

Drag doesn't have an opinion one way or the other about this, as drag hasn't used Arch. But drag liked reading this comment and would enjoy reading a discussion about it.

Hector Martin (Marcan42) was the lead developer of Asahi Linux, until he recently resigned. He had a Mastodon page where he would talk about AL development and hardware stuff, as well as frustrations dealing with kernel maintainers to upstream things like Rust stuff (long before the beef that went down this month).

Marcan has made it clear he needs a break, but I really wish he at least kept his Mastodon page up, perhaps in read-only. I'll admit, I liked his posts so much I looked at it daily. I had a bookmark keyword in Firefox: I'd type tr in the URL bar to go to https://social.treehouse.systems/@marcan.

cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/55921070