Latest revision as of 13:00, 20 September 2024

Gnome Desktop aims to get things done with ease, comfort, and control.

Note: Before installing any desktop,

Create a non-privileged user account for security reasons, if you skipped this step during Installation.
Enable community repository. Setup-desktop script automatically does this for you.
Install graphics driver for your video hardware.

If you are using Hyper-V and Xorg refuses to start, blacklist the hyperv_drm module by adding it to the /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf file.

Installation using setup-desktop

The Alpine Linux script for setting up a desktop quickly is setup-desktop.

# setup-desktop

On running the above command, you will be prompted to select a desktop environment.

Which desktop environment? ('gnome', 'plasma', 'xfce', 'mate', 'sway' or 'none') [none]

Once you have chosen a desktop environment, this script installs the chosen desktop along with all the necessary packages, firefox browser and adds the necessary services to run on startup. You can reboot when complete and the system will boot into a graphical login screen with the desktop environment. Depending on the desktop chosen, the script also activates the necessary services like dbus, elogind, login manager etc..

To view all the packages that are installed by the script for the chosen desktop you can issue the below command:

# cat /sbin/setup-desktop

When gnome is chosen, the above utility also installs Pipewire for audio and gdm as display manager.

Installing Additional packages

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

Updating GNOME packages

Most GNOME apps and core systems follow a common versioning pattern, and have a similar release cadence. In order to reduce the workload on maintainers, the gnome-aports-utils project exists. It contains a series of scripts that can be used to detect changes on GNOME-related projects, and commit them. When doing major GNOME updates, and doing minor updates on many projects, these scripts can help warranty that no project is forgotten, and reduce the time needed to build and test the upgrades. We recommend everybody to use and contribute to that repository instead of pushing updates for every GNOME component individually.

Major GNOME upgrade

About every half year, GNOME publishes a new major release. These are announced at: https://release.gnome.org/calendar/ (note the dates are the tarball-due-dates and not the actual release drop).

With this release the whole GNOME stack gets upgraded, this includes G-related libraries, the GNOME shell with mutter, GNOME core apps and other packages following the same schedule. The GNOME release engeneering team publishes dates for alpha, beta, release candidates and stable versions for every major version, most GNOME core packages follow their schedules, but not all of them. Announcements of the releng team are posted on the GNOME forum (https://discourse.gnome.org/tag/release-team) and Release Notes for each phase (with it's upgraded packages) are at: https://download.gnome.org/core/

Therefore we should also upgrade along the dependency tree (glib -> gtk4 -> mutter -> gnome-shell -> other apps). Most important libraries are glib, gtk4, libadwaita. These are mostly already released in the alpha-phase and don't contain many breaking changed. To upgrade other GNOME core package to the latest version in a major version, you can use gnome-aports-utils or also check https://download.gnome.org/sources (sorted by date) (thats where all GNOME core maintainers upload their tarballs).

Also take a look at Gentoo's upgrading guide: https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Project:GNOME/GNOME_Bumping_Guide

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 1: / Line 1: @@
-= Initial setup =
+[https://www.gnome.org/ Gnome Desktop] aims to get things done with ease, comfort, and control.
-Start by booting up Alpine (see [[Installation|these]] instructions on how to do that)<BR>
-When you Alpine is up and running, do the initial setup.
-{{Cmd|setup-alpine}}
-= Install packages =
+{{:Include:Setup-desktop}}
-Install basic desktop system and gnome packages.<BR>
-This might take a few minutes depending on your network speed.
-{{Cmd|apk add setup-xorg-base alpine-desktop gnome-base lxdm}}
-<BR>
-Lxdm is a display manager.  You can use a different one such as slim by replacing {{Cmd|lxdm}} with {{Cmd|slim}}
-== Optional packages ==
+When gnome is chosen, the above utility also installs [[PipeWire|Pipewire]] for audio and [[gdm]] as display manager.
-=== Video and Input packages ===
-You <u>might</u> also want to install a package suitable for your video chipset and input devices.<BR>
-For example, if you have an Sis video chipset install 'xf86-video-sis', for Intel video chipset install 'xf86-video-intel'.<BR>
-{{Cmd|apk add xf86-video-sis}}
-and / or
-{{Cmd|apk add xf86-input-synaptics}}
-Run 'apk search xf86-video*' to see available xf86-video packages.<BR>
+= Installing Additional packages =
-Run 'apk search xf86-input*' to see available xf86-input packages.<BR>
-=== acpid ===
+If you want, you can install additional GNOME apps for a more complete GNOME experience with:
-If you installed your Alpine Linux as a VirtualBox or VMWare guest you might find it handy be able send ACPI shutdown.<BR>
+{{Cmd|# apk add gnome-apps-extra}}
-{{Cmd|rc-update add acpid}}
-= Configure xorg-server (optional) =
+And even all of GNOME games with:
-You can configure xorg-server and make your modifications
+{{Cmd|# apk add gnome-games-collection}}
-{{Cmd|Xorg -configure}}
-This will result in `/root/xorg.conf.new`. You can modify this file to fit your needs.<BR>
-(When finished modifying and testing the above configuration file, move it to `/etc/X11/xorg.conf` for normal usage.)
-== udev ==
+= Enabling GNOME Shell screen recording =
-Adding udev might help you with some finicky hardware like touchpads.
+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|apk add udev
-/etc/init.d/udev start && /etc/init.d/udev-postmount start
-rc-update add udev sysinit
-rc-update add udev-postmount default
-}}
-Adding evdev might also be necessary, for example if the keyboard doesn't work in X...
-{{Cmd|apk add xf86-input-evdev}}
-= Create user accounts =
+= Enabling GNOME Software =
-Create a normal user account.
+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|adduser ncopa}}
+{{cmd|# rc-update add apk-polkit-server default && rc-service apk-polkit-server start}}
-Optionally, give that user sudo permissions in /etc/sudoers.
+= Updating GNOME packages =
-= Start your desktop =
+Most GNOME apps and core systems follow a common versioning pattern, and have a similar release cadence. In order to reduce the workload on maintainers, the [https://gitlab.alpinelinux.org/pabloyoyoista/gnome-aports-utils gnome-aports-utils] project exists. It contains a series of scripts that can be used to detect changes on GNOME-related projects, and commit them. When doing major GNOME updates, and doing minor updates on many projects, these scripts can help warranty that no project is forgotten, and reduce the time needed to build and test the upgrades. We recommend everybody to use and contribute to that repository instead of pushing updates for every GNOME component individually.
-Start lxdm and log in with your new user.
-{{Cmd|rc-service lxdm start}}
-Once you have verified that it actually works you can make lxdm start up at boot:
+== Major GNOME upgrade ==
-{{Cmd|rc-update add lxdm}}
-Or if using slim:
+About every half year, GNOME publishes a new major release. These are announced at: https://release.gnome.org/calendar/ (note the dates are the tarball-due-dates and not the actual release drop).
-{{Cmd|rc-service slim start}}
+With this release the whole GNOME stack gets upgraded, this includes G-related libraries, the GNOME shell with mutter, [https://apps.gnome.org/ GNOME core apps] and other packages following the same schedule. The [https://matrix.to/#/%23release-team:gnome.org GNOME release engeneering team] publishes dates for alpha, beta, release candidates and stable versions for every major version, most GNOME core packages follow their schedules, but not all of them. Announcements of the releng team are posted on the GNOME forum (https://discourse.gnome.org/tag/release-team) and Release Notes for each phase (with it's upgraded packages) are at: https://download.gnome.org/core/
-and once confirmed as working enable it at boot:
+Therefore we should also upgrade along the dependency tree (glib -> gtk4 -> mutter -> gnome-shell -> other apps). Most important libraries are glib, gtk4, libadwaita. These are mostly already released in the alpha-phase and don't contain many breaking changed. To upgrade other GNOME core package to the latest version in a major version, you can use [https://gitlab.alpinelinux.org/pabloyoyoista/gnome-aports-utils gnome-aports-utils] or also check [https://download.gnome.org/sources/?C=M&O=D https://download.gnome.org/sources (sorted by date)] (thats where all GNOME core maintainers upload their tarballs).
-{{Cmd|rc-update add slim}}
+Also take a look at Gentoo's upgrading guide: https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Project:GNOME/GNOME_Bumping_Guide
 = Troubleshooting =
-If you are unable to login, check /var/log/lxdm.log, there may be output there from X to indicate failed modules, etc.
-<BR>
-If you are unable to login, or you see an error "Failed to execute login command", you should check ~/.xinitrc with your preferred text editor (vi, nano, etc) and ensure that it is set to boot into gnome.  To do this, the 'exec' line (usually the last line in the file) should read "exec gnome-session".
-If ~/.xinitrc does not exist, create it and add the exec line (using your favourite text editor or cat or whatever).  As an example:
-{{Cmd|touch ~/.xinitrc}}
+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|echo "exec gnome-session" >> ~/.xinitrc}}
+If GNOME Terminal doesn't start, add the following to /etc/profile.d/locale.sh: <code>LANG=en_US.UTF-8</code> 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 <code>org.gnome.desktop.a11y.applications screen-keyboard-enabled</code> to <code>false</code> for the <code>gdm</code> user with <code>dconf</code>
+== 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:
+{{Cmd|# apk add mesa-gles}}
+== 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]]