Niri Compositor

demm

KaOS is in the process of investigating whether a move to a new init system is a possibility. Dinit is what is looked at as a replacement for the full-blown systemd (no matter the outcome, udev will still be used from systemd).

All is still in very early stages, so don't think this switch will happen soon (or if at all possible).
A Plasma Desktop is not the easiest point to start this testing, so for an easier start, the Niri Wayland compositor is added to the repositories. This is a tiling window manager, and to make it more of a complete setup, Quickshell is added and can be used with Niri and a Quickshell based option like Noctalia.

Image shows Niri running windowed in Plasma, with the Noctalia shell, 2 tiling & 1 floating window:

tuxman

demm

Hi demm and Kaos crew,
I recently learned about Kaos Linux.
I am quite intrigued by the combination of a Qt based, systemd free Linux system using Niri.
I have already explored the live iso Niri release and will commit to bare metal when the Dinit transition has occurred.
For what it is worth, I have been a tiling window manager user for a long time and presently use Niri on a nixos based system.
Is there any guidance on how long it might be till we see the Dinit based system?
Thanks,
Tuxman

bvbfan

It looks like Artix Linux is using Dinit with Plasma (and other spins)

demm

bvbfan That, I know (so does Chimera), but the move & testing dinit is not that straightforward with Plasma, that is why niri.
Plus, there are quite a few commits recently in Plasma (for example plasma-login), were systemd will be absolutely required.
https://invent.kde.org/plasma/plasma-login-manager/-/commit/572c2bef48a470ac1deec84f890dc1de31719204

bvbfan

demm
Hmm, KDE still supports BSD I think, so it needs alternative way to do it.

Conan_Kudo

demm Now that systemd has come to a point of demanding filesystems setup to be according to their preferred way, it really moves away from being an init.

As far as I'm aware, the only actual requirement is the /usr merge, which isn't just a requirement by systemd. This is something that lots of projects have basically assumed and/or required for the past several years.

And pretty much all service management/initialization systems have filesystem requirements since that's how they support early stage boot and service configuration properly.

demm Plus, there are quite a few commits recently in Plasma (for example plasma-login), were systemd will be absolutely required.

Insofar as this is concerned, you could continue to use SDDM or use LightDM (with the KDE greeter) instead. Both are supported options for KDE Plasma on BSD (as an example).

demm

Nope, they start dropping BSD, example:
https://invent.kde.org/plasma/plasma-login-manager/-/commit/4098ec6cc28ddbefa2b6c9083f6c0768f982da46

orangezipper

What has caused this exploration into a new init system?

demm

orangezipper What has caused this exploration into a new init system?

As you might have noticed, KaOS has been stuck on an old version of systemd for a few years now.
Systemd 254 is the last version that fully supports using (what they call) a split /usr setup, ie, not symlinking the whole distribution together.
With 256, all support for Aufs (used in the ISO creation) has been removed too, so the whole foundation of KaOS no longer aligns with what systemd demands.
Option now is to try another init system, staying with 254 can't be done forever. 257 is currently being tested in the build repo, even though it doesn't support the split /usr, seems work OK.

ISO creation is not possible with that version, all kinds of test have been ongoing to try and resolve, no luck so far.
Plasma has quite a few commits lately that will start requiring latest systemd, so KaOS is really at a crossroad right now as to how to continue.....

bvbfan

demm
The best you can do is to identify the commit (it will be good if it's one, but many could be done as well) by searching of changed file in commit history and revert. It depends of source code organisation, it could be easy or really hard. The other option (which could be better approach) is to create upstream patch for optional /usr split, you have to update it on every new release until it got merged, meanwhile KaOS will use that patch to keep its foundation.

orangezipper

@demm Ok, that makes more sense. Haha, no, I have not noticed the version of systemd on KaOS. I'm a very simple user and I rarely ever get down into the deep guts of any Linux distro.

Your explanation is very helpful, and I appreciate it. Even with my very light knowledge of Linux, I know that init systems generate lots of comments and passions. For me, I have no opinion one way or the other. As long as I can install KaOS easily, update it regularly and use Brave and Libre Office, I am good to go! So far, so good.

I'm sorry this issue is now requiring a decision from you. I hope you can find a good path forward. If I was a coding nerd, I would happily assist. But I am not a coder...at all.

demm

orangezipper I know that init systems generate lots of comments and passions

So far, it was always best to just stay with mainstream, which for the last ~ 12-14 years has been systemd. In KaOS, systemd has always been stripped from as many non-init features as possible (exception the systemd-bootloader, which had been used for KaOS for UEFI, that is why Limine is added now and will replace systemd-bootloader after plenty of testing), since (imo) an init has no job setting network for example.

Now that systemd has come to a point of demanding filesystems setup to be according to their preferred way, it really moves away from being an init.

I am actively working on seeing how far Niri & Noctalia can duplicate the Plasma experience for most/all users (keeping KDE Qt apps as default), if that is viable, then there will be a whole lot of new options going forward.

demm

Niri has been running on two of my systems. Last few days on my main workstation too (besides a few weeks now, a test laptop), so an update with some screenshots:

Last shot shows the optional dock on hover

orangezipper

@demm Wow, that really does look nice. Very sleek and pleasant design. As long as I can run Brave, a very basic text editor like Kate, VLC or Haruna, and Libre Office, it'll be perfect for me. Though, that dock at the bottom middle would be annoying to me...just as it's so annoying in Windows 11. But, unlike Windows 11, I'd guess the Niri dock can be moved.

demm

As said, dock is optional, see the first screenshot, during setup just untick the dock, and it is gone (I don't use it either, just added it for the screenshot as an example of possibilities).

orangezipper

@demm Fantastic. That's great.

shalokshalom

Looks very beautiful.

demm

An ISO is created so more can check Niri/Noctalia.
This ISO is only linked here, will not be a real release. Neither is this ISO installable (Calamares will need a lot of changes to remove all the Plasma settings & include the Niri settings), so this is only intended to run in Live mode.

Virtualbox is not ready to run Wayland native, it normally uses XWayland, but that is not used on Niri, so, only run Live on real hardware. And only use the free drivers.
https://sourceforge.net/projects/kaos-test/files/iso/KaOS-2025.12.14-x86_64.iso
SHA256SUM:

2384e094158b8450c602d9031a6bcd62fefa2bdced66e38d0d7d2e2941767e28  KaOS-2025.12.14-x86_64.iso

demm

@Conan_Kudo Plasma-login was just one example, drkonqi is another https://invent.kde.org/plasma/drkonqi/-/merge_requests/323 (and I have seen more, so not sure how BSD can/will be supported by Plasma).

Conan_Kudo

demm Plasma-login was just one example, drkonqi is another https://invent.kde.org/plasma/drkonqi/-/merge_requests/323 (and I have seen more, so not sure how BSD can/will be supported by Plasma).

Well, that particular instance was announced last April, and nobody replied at all so it appears nobody cared anyway?

There's a larger problem that the people who KDE wants to hear from aren't coming to talk. They aren't replying when KDE asks for feedback in distributions@, they aren't participating in the discussions on Matrix, they aren't even engaging with KDE much in the bug tracker.

What is KDE supposed to do with that? A reasonable person would conclude that there's no real interest or care for these things, and no longer bother.

down8ve

Hi Demm,

Gave it a brief whirl on an AMD Ryzen 7 7700X w/integrated graphics. Fast and smooth. No strangeness in system loads or oddness flagged anywhere. As for Niri/Noctalia, the semi-tiling windows seems fine. As for me I like the dock; some of use like our training wheels.

It strikes me as a logical path forward for the design tweaks you've made to Plasma, a natural upgrade. I suffered no crashes, only a slight flickering of the applications menu whenever it is launched. LibreOffice doesn't launch, but everything seems quite snappy.

demm

Libreoffice launches fine when using the Wayland (Qt6) option, I will update it so it will be included in the launcher/desktop files. For now, launch it with:

SAL_USE_VCLPLUGIN=qt6 libreoffice