Hyprland was a bit too far from what I'm used to, and required too many changes in my workflow, but all of this DHH pushing convinced me to try out Linux on a day to day basis and I'm switching to Fedora/Gnome so that's still a win for the cause I'd say.
The real news is that Omarchy 2.0 has just been released, as well as an Omarchy distribution ISO based on Arch. Installation is fairly quick (~5 minutes on a fresh machine), given you have bandwidth.
I might be in the minority but I actually like overlapping windows - often the entire window is not necessary to get the data I am interested in. Right now I'm running tests in another window and I have a sliver of that window visible while the majority of the screen real-estate gets used for the browser in primary window.
I sometimes do this as well. Most tiling wms do support overlapping windows thouhg it isn't the default. But then many regular window managers will support placement of windows in various splits manually with a keypress or two so in reality the wins for tiling wms are very small in normal use. I think you have to have a crazy rate of opening and closing windows to benefit from automatic tiling which doesn't fit with my actual usage outside the terminal where I use a terminal specific tiling.
Several times I have tried to move to scrolling as I like it a lot more than tiling.
The real story with Omarchy is Hyprland. Feels like the first time the desktop Linux is not only fun but that there's a far better case being made for switching to desktop Linux over Windows, not only because of less resource usage, but also a new (old) paradigm in tiling windows, repackaged in a way that doesn't make people want to smash their computer.
Hyprland itself comes with such nice defaults that it isn't surprising at all that it's getting as much attention as it is, for better or worse.
I've been using Ubuntu exclusively since around 2005 when they sent you CD-ROMs (remember those?). I've been trying to switch to Arch for about 5 years now. Not because Ubuntu was broken, but because I wanted something new. I sometimes install it on an old laptop, marvel at the perceived speed increase of that old(er) machine, tell myself I'll switch tomorrow when I can find a spare day for it, and 5 years later it still didn't happen. My older laptop now runs Omarchy. And it's great and all, but I still don't think it will happen. My next laptop, for sure, will switch to Arch. Possibly. Maybe.
Setting the `download` property on all of your screenshot image anchors is a very odd choice: not only does it make it very difficult to view the images quickly & easily in-browser, it also clogs up my Downloads directory with things I don't intend to keep.
Not only that, but it goes beyond client-side measure: someone has gone to the extra trouble of also setting `content-disposition: attachment` on each of the image HTTP response headers to make absolutely sure they can't be viewed easily in browser, even with workarounds.
When he saw issues with the Apple ecosystem, decides to make useful, well thought-out tooling for helping developers adopt Linux. When he saw how expensive the cloud can be, goes on to build open source tooling for deploying on bare-metal servers. Both have been successful.
Not just blog posts. Blog posts followed by hard work to fix the problem.
I don't think despised is correct. Drew made an argument for more mature and responsible behavior and leadership but some people just want to write code and not manage a community. I think that can be a lot to expect from some young programer thrown into the public eye, Hyprland is a well regarded implementation amongst tiling wms but the category always has and in my opinion always will have limited appeal for good reason.
For mac users interested in tiling (ish) managers, but not willing to make the leap DHH made, I highly recommend the Magnet app, which gets me most of the goodness he is demoing in the first part here ... (and maybe a little more?)
> I don't know when we'll literally get "The Year of Linux on the Desktop"
Not for as long as we keep telling people that the best software is like this:
> Because I do think that Hyprland deserves its reputation of being difficult! Not because the core tiling window manager is hard, but because it comes incredibly bare-boned in the box. You have to figure out everything yourself. Even how to get a lock screen or idle timing or a menu bar or bluetooth setting or... you get the idea.
My mom just bought a replacement Windows laptop, and even that needs some gentle prodding before it can be used by a regular human person - and that's only gentle because we told her that she should buy the Professional version of Windows, and not the adware-riddled Home one.
I guess as long as we assume that the Year of Linux on the Desktop has arrived when a slightly higher percentage of nerds who are happy to endlessly tinker with settings adopts it as their daily driver, then sure. It's any day now.
Nix is hard to get into. The lang is weird, and I'm a functional programmer. It's not very well documented. Flakes just don't seem to be documented at all? But are used everywhere?
Somehow, DHH has tapped into an enthusiasm for Linux I haven't felt in a long time. It's so great to see and to experience it with him! When I first discovered Linux it started a journey, from wonder to pragmatism (Mandrake [2004] -> Slackware -> Ubuntu -> Arch -> NixOS [current]).
I also spend many nights tweaking and re-tweaking, compiling kernels to get the maximum out of my desktops on rotating cubes with reflections and fish inside, the early Beryl/Xgl days. I miss those days, but Linux is a tool now, sometimes even just a runtime! Still have it on any computer though, and it just works, it feels like home!
From that late 2.4 kernel, manually mounting the first USB drives to what we have now. Super slick and smooth desktops, COW files systems, the ability to run almost any software. I love Linux.
(RedHat[Office Max] -> Yellow Dog -> Gentoo -> Arch).
Moved from Gentoo to Arch because I was tired of compiling system updates. Was fun compiling when tweaking the kernel and compiler settings trying to maximize Doom 3 on Linux. Enemy Territory didn't need any tweaking.
I don't mind new or more distros. Helps learn new ways of doing things to make Linux more presentable to others. Tools still needs to be presentable to the masses.
Hyprland is delightful, and the exposure DHH is giving both to it, Arch, and Linux is great.
Since Hyprland is composable and customizable by design, building out a functional workspace from scratch is an undertaking. On the other hand, there are number of other pre-configured dot-file "spins" worth trying that produce a nice Hyprland setup.
I like Omarchy, but ultimately settled on a Cachyos + Hyprland setup using Ml4W dotfiles. Like Omarchy, ML4W builds a very nice setup that isn't too garish and with sensible defaults. However, I benefit from Cachyos kernel optimizations and I'll admit I've become a convert to Fish. (Omarchy is the only Hyprland spin I've seen that keeps to Bash as the default interactive shell for Kitty/Alacritty.)
As I do like keeping up with Omarchy's evolution, it would be great if DHH could separate the Hyprland stuff from the rest of what he packages into his quasi-distro and make it available to folks who already have an Arch or Arch-derived setup they like. Personally, I'd like to revisit Omarchy from time to time without having to install another OS (Hyprland doesn't work well with VMs.)
The thing with ML4W is that by screenshots it looks like any other desktop environment with overlapping mess of differently sized windows. While Omarchy pushes the tiling manager aspect.
It's the idea that most people don't actually know what they want, at least not at first.
Several pages after:
Making a choice #
I built Omakub when I first switched to Linux. I ran it as my daily driver for over a year. It's an excellent choice for anyone making the switch from Windows or Mac for the first time.
But today I run Omarchy. It's not as familiar, it's more of an acquired taste, but boy, when you acquire the taste for tiling window managers, it's hard to go back to using the mouse to drag windows around. The whole system just flows through your fingertips!
34 comments
[ 6.6 ms ] story [ 97.6 ms ] threadThe real news is that Omarchy 2.0 has just been released, as well as an Omarchy distribution ISO based on Arch. Installation is fairly quick (~5 minutes on a fresh machine), given you have bandwidth.
https://github.com/basecamp/omarchy/releases/tag/v2.0.0
Here is the updated Omarchy Manual to get a good feel for things: https://learn.omacom.io/2/the-omarchy-manual
Several times I have tried to move to scrolling as I like it a lot more than tiling.
Hyprland itself comes with such nice defaults that it isn't surprising at all that it's getting as much attention as it is, for better or worse.
https://docs.projectbluefin.io/bluefin-dx/
Setting the `download` property on all of your screenshot image anchors is a very odd choice: not only does it make it very difficult to view the images quickly & easily in-browser, it also clogs up my Downloads directory with things I don't intend to keep.
Not only that, but it goes beyond client-side measure: someone has gone to the extra trouble of also setting `content-disposition: attachment` on each of the image HTTP response headers to make absolutely sure they can't be viewed easily in browser, even with workarounds.
When he saw issues with the Apple ecosystem, decides to make useful, well thought-out tooling for helping developers adopt Linux. When he saw how expensive the cloud can be, goes on to build open source tooling for deploying on bare-metal servers. Both have been successful.
Not just blog posts. Blog posts followed by hard work to fix the problem.
However he seems to have the ability to build movements, and I don't know why.
Not for as long as we keep telling people that the best software is like this:
> Because I do think that Hyprland deserves its reputation of being difficult! Not because the core tiling window manager is hard, but because it comes incredibly bare-boned in the box. You have to figure out everything yourself. Even how to get a lock screen or idle timing or a menu bar or bluetooth setting or... you get the idea.
My mom just bought a replacement Windows laptop, and even that needs some gentle prodding before it can be used by a regular human person - and that's only gentle because we told her that she should buy the Professional version of Windows, and not the adware-riddled Home one.
I guess as long as we assume that the Year of Linux on the Desktop has arrived when a slightly higher percentage of nerds who are happy to endlessly tinker with settings adopts it as their daily driver, then sure. It's any day now.
I also spend many nights tweaking and re-tweaking, compiling kernels to get the maximum out of my desktops on rotating cubes with reflections and fish inside, the early Beryl/Xgl days. I miss those days, but Linux is a tool now, sometimes even just a runtime! Still have it on any computer though, and it just works, it feels like home!
From that late 2.4 kernel, manually mounting the first USB drives to what we have now. Super slick and smooth desktops, COW files systems, the ability to run almost any software. I love Linux.
Moved from Gentoo to Arch because I was tired of compiling system updates. Was fun compiling when tweaking the kernel and compiler settings trying to maximize Doom 3 on Linux. Enemy Territory didn't need any tweaking.
I don't mind new or more distros. Helps learn new ways of doing things to make Linux more presentable to others. Tools still needs to be presentable to the masses.
Since Hyprland is composable and customizable by design, building out a functional workspace from scratch is an undertaking. On the other hand, there are number of other pre-configured dot-file "spins" worth trying that produce a nice Hyprland setup.
I like Omarchy, but ultimately settled on a Cachyos + Hyprland setup using Ml4W dotfiles. Like Omarchy, ML4W builds a very nice setup that isn't too garish and with sensible defaults. However, I benefit from Cachyos kernel optimizations and I'll admit I've become a convert to Fish. (Omarchy is the only Hyprland spin I've seen that keeps to Bash as the default interactive shell for Kitty/Alacritty.)
As I do like keeping up with Omarchy's evolution, it would be great if DHH could separate the Hyprland stuff from the rest of what he packages into his quasi-distro and make it available to folks who already have an Arch or Arch-derived setup they like. Personally, I'd like to revisit Omarchy from time to time without having to install another OS (Hyprland doesn't work well with VMs.)
It's the idea that most people don't actually know what they want, at least not at first.
Several pages after:
Making a choice # I built Omakub when I first switched to Linux. I ran it as my daily driver for over a year. It's an excellent choice for anyone making the switch from Windows or Mac for the first time. But today I run Omarchy. It's not as familiar, it's more of an acquired taste, but boy, when you acquire the taste for tiling window managers, it's hard to go back to using the mouse to drag windows around. The whole system just flows through your fingertips!
Why? You just killed the whole omakase concept
The main page says it's "opinionated" and has two thumbnails of desktops that are mostly just a background image.