My practical Linux desktop config.

Variables

Variables are stored in .config/environment.d. 99-local.conf is intended for machine-specific variables and are not tracked by Git.

Actual variables are generated by 30-systemd-environment-d-generator and export-ed by ~/.profile and fish.

ln -s $DOTFILES_PATH/environment.d ~/.config/
ln -s $DOTFILES_PATH/.profile ~/

Login

We use greetd and tuigreet with a custom script. Install greetd and greetd-tuigreet on Arch Linux. Config in greetd. To install:

sudo pacman -S greetd greetd-tuigreet seatd
sudo cp $DOTFILES_PATH/greetd/config.toml /etc/greetd/config.toml
# This is for avoiding systemd log to litter the TUI greet screen
sudo cp $DOTFILES_PATH/systemd/system/greetd.service.d /etc/systemd/system/
sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable seatd.service greetd.service

Note that this config file depends on a properly loaded .env file.

systemd

To install systemd user services:

ln -s $DOTFILES_PATH/systemd/* ~/.config/systemd/user/

And enable them just like any other systemd user services.

Sway

# xdg-desktop-portal-wlr: for sharing desktop via PipeWire
# fcitx5-im: input method support (awaiting new sway release to support popup window in wezterm)
# wl-clipboard: provide CLI clipboard tools
# grim && slurp: select a region and take a scrrenshot
# fuzzel: application launcher
# wezterm: terminal emulator
# swayidle && swaylock: idle management and screen lock
# swaybg: wallpaper management
# waybar: status bar
# mako: notification daemon
# gnome-keyring: stores secrets
sudo pacman -S sway xdg-desktop-portal-wlr fcitx5-im brightnessctl wl-clipboard grim slurp swayidle swaylock swaybg mako gnome-keyring

# Create and edit local settings (used by Sway)
cp -v ~/.dotfiles/bin/local_settings.example ~/.dotfiles/bin/local_settings

Sway requires sway-session.target from systemd to function properly.

ln -s $DOTFILES_PATH/sway ~/.config/

Fontconfig

This fontconfig requires inter-font, noto-fonts, noto-fonts-cjk, noto-fonts-emoji and ttf-sarasa-gothic.

sudo pacman -S noto-fonts noto-fonts-cjk noto-fonts-emoji ttf-sarasa-gothic
ln -s $DOTFILES_PATH/fontconfig ~/.config/

Email

isync for IMAP syncing, msmtp for SMTP sending, and notmuch for indexing. Viewing email in Emacs.

Password is stored in system keyring (for Sway I use gnome-keyring). Check msmtp config on how to enroll keys.

sudo pacman -S isync notmuch msmtp
ln -sf "$DOTFILES_PATH"/{isync, msmtp, notmuch} ~/.config/
mkdir -p ~/.mail/{lecs,csc,gmail}
systemctl --user enable --now notmuch.timer

Everything else

ln -s $DOTFILES_PATH/i3status-rust ~/.config/
ln -s $DOTFILES_PATH/wezterm ~/.config/
ln -s $DOTFILES_PATH/mako ~/.config/
ln -s $DOTFILES_PATH/fish ~/.config/
ln -s $DOTFILES_PATH/tmux ~/.config/
# mpd won't automatically create state folder, so do it manually
mkdir -p ~/.local/share/mpd
ln -s $DOTFILES_PATH/mpd ~/.config/
ln -s $DOTFILES_PATH/mpv ~/.config/
ln -s $DOTFILES_PATH/ncmpcpp ~/.config/