Back to basics

Arch and his little surprises

Since switching from Windows and macOS, I’ve been running Arch Linux. It’s a great, stable distro, and I can’t imagine wanting to use anything else. Like any operating system, Arch has its quirks. There are some things you assume come as standard, but on Arch you have to install a little extra. You’re not always aware of this until you come across it.

This weekend, I made what is likely to be my final switch of window manager for the time being. And I say for the time being deliberately, because anyone who follows me knows I tend to switch quite often. Time to look back on that journey, and explain why I’ve now ended up with something that’s actually been around for years.

Python as a configuration language – that appealed to me

My time on Arch began with Qtile as my window manager. I was very happy with it for a long time. Python as a configuration language feels natural to me, and it just works. It’s just that ‘ricing’ everything, as it’s called in the community, takes a lot of time. I’d got quite far with that, but in the meantime I kept seeing more and more lovely screenshots on Reddit of a Wayland compositor called Hyprland.

One developer, one point of failure

Hyprland appealed to me for two reasons. Ricen seemed easier, and it meant switching straight from X11 to Wayland. That sounded good to me, and I have to say, it certainly was. It looked stunning and the animations were smooth.

But there was a pattern. Often, after an update, part of my configuration would break again. Something I’d put a lot of effort into getting to look good and work properly would suddenly stop working. I found that really annoying. When I read on a bit further, I discovered that there is actually only one lead developer at the heart of Hyprland, namely Vaxry. There are contributors, but Vaxry is the one calling the shots. So I really see this as a one-man show.

I think impulsive changes are the cause of those broken configurations. To me, that’s not production-ready, no matter how good the system is. I know better than anyone that one is no. I’ve experienced that first-hand in my work with infrastructure. One person can drop out and that’s it. I found that level of dependency unacceptable in my day-to-day working environment.

Scrolling tiling sounded like the solution

I was still having a few issues with Wayland that made me long for Qtile, so I went back to using that for a long time. Until some lovely screenshots appeared on Reddit again, showing a slightly different approach. A scrolling tiling window manager. The idea piqued my curiosity. Smooth animations, a good team of maintainers, and stable. That turned out to be Niri, and I’ve been trying it out for the last three months.

It went well at first. Niri combined with DankMaterialShell ran very smoothly, DMS provided some nice features, and the configuration was straightforward. On paper, I had everything I wanted.

Where on earth is that window?

But I still found it annoying, and at first I didn’t even really know where that feeling was coming from. Until it dawned on me: where on earth was that window? With my three monitors, it eventually became a complete mess. All that swiping up and down and left and right just became too much. It felt like using a factory hall to service a Mini Cooper with your tools scattered everywhere. There’s no end to it.

What’s more, with windows that are wider than your screen, Niri automatically scrolls along as soon as you touch the mouse. It’s a small detail, but if you keep triggering it accidentally all day long, it drives you mad.

i3 has been around for years, and with good reason

So I asked myself: what do I actually want? Back to basics, but I’d rather not use X11 anymore. Qtile and Wayland don’t work very well together, and there are now better alternatives. I looked into what the foundation was, and that’s i3. The in-place replacement for i3 on Wayland has become Sway.

I’ve now switched my Niri configuration and keybindings over to Sway, and switched back from DMS to Waybar. For now, it feels like coming home:

• Windows are back where I expect them to be.
• No screen jumps when a pop-up or scratchpad overlay appears.
• When I move the mouse, my screen stays put.
• Three monitors feel like three monitors again, not like one endless conveyor belt.

What’s more, Sway has a mature development team, a long track record and a configuration format that is virtually identical to i3. This also means that there is a vast amount of documentation and examples available.

Boring is a feature

For now, I feel that my computer is predictable, boring and usable again. And that’s exactly what I want. So it’s not always the case that more is better. Endless options are confusing, and that secretly gets really annoying.

If you’re focused on productivity, a tiling window manager is brilliant. But as far as I’m concerned, nothing else needs to change. No scrolling, no endless workspaces, no animations to distract me. Just windows in fixed positions, on the monitor where I’ve placed them.

Sometimes the best upgrade is a step back to what has worked for years.