- cross-posted to:
- linux@programming.dev
- cross-posted to:
- linux@programming.dev
I’ve been using Linux for years, but as the proprietary alternatives get more aggressive with telemetry and adverts, I wanted to document the choices that actually keep my desktop predictable.
This isn’t a manual, but a practical overview of my setup. From why I’ve settled on CachyOS and KDE Plasma for my main rig, to the reality of dealing with proprietary software and app compatibility in 2026. It’s just an honest look at the transition and why I’m done with the corporate defaults.
I’ve said some negative things about KDE Plasma feeling like three desktop oses taped together, but the latest version the fixed all that and it’s pretty good.
I still want to destroy all the hotksys and window decorations, but it just works, and it works well, and it works for edge cases where Gnome and Cosmic crash or fail silently.
KDE is pretty good, and I say that about a very small amount of software.
Also: I just switched to Nixos and now I can actually setup systemd units without wanting to shoot myself in the face. So that’s nice.
You know you can change the hotkeys and window decorations right? That’s the great thing about KDE. You have choices.
Sure, but being good out of the box is very important for normal users. Power users love the crazy customization. Normal people don’t really care.
Fair point, but out of the box KDE has pretty sane defaults these days. It’s a very inoffensive desktop.
I have just a couple customizations that I do immediately on a fresh install, but it certainly wouldn’t kill me to use it as it comes.
I know but I don’t really care whether my OS is good for normal users. In fact the more it is the less I’ll like it.
Normal users love someone taking control and all their data and telling them what’s what. A “Linux for the masses” will be inevitably pure trash, something akin to ChromeOS now (which is kinda already linux for the masses). They literally want all the things we hate. For a company to know everything about them, to take all their data, to tell them what they can do and they can’t so they feel ‘safe’.
As soon as Linux becomes a masses thing, it means lots of money can be made off it, and companies will jump on it to enshittify it as much as they can. So I’m really hoping that “the year of Linux on the desktop” will never happen.
Better still, in the Nix world there’s https://github.com/nix-community/plasma-manager which allows you to set up all the settings exactly once, and then auto-apply them on all the machines!
I tend to just copy my dotfiles over between machines. I’m not a fan of declarative management and even less of immutable OS’es.
I’m a huge fan of tiling window managers, and i3 is still the king of getting the hell out of my way and letting me work/play. That’s the beauty of Linux systems, everyone gets to set things up how they want.