Revision as of 21:50, 28 November 2023

Prerequisites

Install AlpineLinux
Create a user account (optional but recommended)
Enable the Community repository

Installing packages

Install basic desktop system and gnome packages.

# setup-desktop gnome

It will take care of installing the basic packages and setting up the display manager.

If you want, you can install additional GNOME apps for a more complete GNOME experience with:

# apk add gnome-apps-extra

And even all of GNOME games with:

# apk add gnome-games-collection

Enabling GNOME Shell screen recording

For the embedded screen recording in GNOME Shell to work, you will need some additional packages:

# apk add pipewire wireplumber gst-plugin-pipewire

Enabling GNOME Software

For GNOME Software to be able to manage APK packages, it needs the apk-polkit-server service working. To enable it and start it up:

# rc-update add apk-polkit-server default && rc-service apk-polkit-server start

Troubleshooting

If you are unable to log in, check /var/log/gdm/greeter.log, there may be info there from X that indicates failed modules, etc.

If GNOME Terminal doesn't start, add the following to /etc/profile.d/locale.sh: LANG=en_US.UTF-8 and reboot.

If the on-screen keyboard shows up in GDM after installing other UIs such as Phosh, you need to disable it by opening the Accessibility menu (top right) when you are in the GDM login screen. You can disable the on-screen keyboard there. Or set org.gnome.desktop.a11y.applications screen-keyboard-enabled to false for the gdm user with dconf

Slow applications or rendering issues

Please note that some applications, i.e. Gnome Web (Epiphany), may require the installation of libraries related to hardware acceleration to work correctly.

In quite some cases, this can be solved by installing mesa-gles (OpenGL ES). Check if you you have issues loading the shared library libGLESv2.so.2. If so, you can install it with:

# apk add mesa-gles

@@ Line 2: / Line 2: @@
 = Prerequisites =
-* [[Installation|Alpine Installation]]
+* [[Installation|Install]] AlpineLinux
-* [[Setting_up_a_new_user#Creating_a_new_user|Create user accounts]]
+* [[Setting_up_a_new_user#Creating_a_new_user|Create a user account]] (optional but recommended)
-* [[Alpine_setup_scripts#setup-xorg-base|Graphical base environment]]
+* [[Repositories#Enabling_the_community_repository|Enable the Community repository]]
-* [[Enable_Community_Repository#Using_community_repositories|Enabled "community" repository]]
 = Installing packages =
 Install basic desktop system and gnome packages.
-{{Cmd|# apk add gnome}}
+{{Cmd|# setup-desktop gnome}}
+It will take care of installing the basic packages and setting up the display manager.
-If you want to, you can also install additional GNOME apps for a more complete GNOME experience with:
+If you want, you can install additional GNOME apps for a more complete GNOME experience with:
-{{Cmd|# apk add gnome-apps}}
+{{Cmd|# apk add gnome-apps-extra}}
+And even all of GNOME games with:
+{{Cmd|# apk add gnome-games-collection}}
-= Graphical login =
+= Enabling GNOME Shell screen recording =
-To start the GDM display manager and login with your user, you need a user other than root for this to succeed, since GDM will refuse starting if no user accounts (meaning accounts with a UID >= 1000) are available.
+For the embedded screen recording in GNOME Shell to work, you will need some additional packages: {{cmd|# apk add pipewire wireplumber gst-plugin-pipewire}}
-{{Cmd|rc-service gdm start}}
-Once you have verified that it actually works you can make gdm start up at boot:
+= Enabling GNOME Software =
-{{Cmd|rc-update add gdm}}
+For GNOME Software to be able to manage APK packages, it needs the <code>apk-polkit-server</code> service working. To enable it and start it up:
+{{cmd|# rc-update add apk-polkit-server default && rc-service apk-polkit-server start}}
-= Enabling terminal apps =
+= Troubleshooting =
-If you want to use the gnome-terminal/other terminal applications you will need to install bash. If you want a typical bash setup also enable bash completion:
-{{cmd|# apk add bash}}
+If you are unable to log in, check /var/log/gdm/greeter.log, there may be info there from X that indicates failed modules, etc.
-{{cmd|# apk add bash-completion}}
+If GNOME Terminal doesn't start, add the following to /etc/profile.d/locale.sh: <code>LANG=en_US.UTF-8</code> and reboot.
-= Troubleshooting =
+If the on-screen keyboard shows up in GDM after installing other UIs such as Phosh, you need to disable it by opening the Accessibility menu (top right) when you are in the GDM login screen. You can disable the on-screen keyboard there. Or set <code>org.gnome.desktop.a11y.applications screen-keyboard-enabled</code> to <code>false</code> for the <code>gdm</code> user with <code>dconf</code>
-If you are unable to login, check /var/log/gdm/greeter.log, there may be output there from X to indicate failed modules, etc.
+== Slow applications or rendering issues ==
+Please note that some applications, i.e. Gnome Web (Epiphany), may require the installation of libraries related to hardware acceleration to work correctly.
+In quite some cases, this can be solved by installing <code>mesa-gles</code> (OpenGL ES). Check if you you have issues loading the shared library <code>libGLESv2.so.2</code>. If so, you can install it with:
-If logging in from GDM returns to logging screen, try {{cmd|# apk add bash}} (bug report: #10953 sorry cannot link yet)
+{{Cmd|# apk add mesa-gles}}
-If GNOME Terminal doesn't start, add the following to /etc/locale.conf: LANG=en_US.UTF-8 and reboot.
+== See also ==
+* [https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/GNOME GNOME - Archwiki]
+* [https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/GNOME GNOME - Gentoo Wiki]
+* [https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/GNOME GNOME - PostmarketOS Wiki]
 [[Category:Desktop]]
+[[Category:Desktop Environments]]