Revision as of 11:20, 3 May 2020

Initial setup

Start by booting up Alpine (see these instructions on how to do that)
When you Alpine is up and running, do the initial setup.

# setup-alpine

# setup-xorg-base

Enable Community Repository

How to Enable the Community Repository

Installing packages

Install basic desktop system and gnome packages. As of right now, these are in the testing repo.
This might take a few minutes depending on your network speed.

# apk add gnome

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

# apk add gnome-apps

Setting up udev

You'll have to enable udev in order for GNOME to function properly.

# apk add udev

/etc/init.d/udev start && /etc/init.d/udev-trigger start && /etc/init.d/udev-settle start
rc-update add udev sysinit
rc-update add udev-trigger sysinit
rc-update add udev-settle sysinit

Setting up Xorg

Even when using GNOME Wayland you'll still need a setup Xorg for XWayland.

Video packages

$ apk search xf86-video

Then install the driver matching to your card, e.g. if you have an Intel iGPU:

# apk add xf86-video-intel

Input packages

Usually libinput is the best choice, as it's integrated best with GNOME and offers advanced functionality (e.g. palm rejection for touchpads).

# apk add xf86-input-libinput

Starting your desktop

Start GDM 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.

rc-service gdm start

Once you have verified that it actually works you can make gdm start up at boot:

rc-update add gdm

Enabling terminal apps

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:

# apk add bash

# apk add bash-completion

Troubleshooting

If you are unable to login, check /var/log/gdm/greeter.log, there may be output there from X to indicate failed modules, etc.

If logging in from GDM returns to logging screen, try

# apk add bash

(bug report: #10953 sorry cannot link yet)

@@ Line 53: / Line 53: @@
 {{Cmd|rc-update add gdm}}
+= Enabling terminal apps =
 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}}