Daily driver guide

From Alpine Linux
Revision as of 08:50, 20 August 2024 by Prabuanand (talk | contribs) (added references related to desktop)

Many people think that Alpine is only made for containers and servers, but it is actually a general purpose distro which can definitely be used as a daily driver.

Alpine is extremely small, simple and resource-efficient, making it easy to customize.

Note: This guide assumes you have already installed a minimal Alpine system by following the Installation guide

Basics

Advanced

  • If you find busybox lacking in features or options, it is easy to get regular stuff working
  • Use Flatpak to add packages that are not in the repositories.
  • Install gcompat package to add a glibc compatability layer which (sometimes) lets you run binaries as normal.
  • Secure your system by installing firewall software like awall or UFW.
  • Install a sandboxing application like AppArmor or Bubblewrap.

Experimental

Warning: Only do below steps, if you're 100% sure what you're doing! Possible bugs in edge and testing could cause data loss or could break your system.


  • If You may want the rolling release version of Alpine Linux, enable the Edge repository.
  • You may want to enable testing repository, as it provides a lot more applications.

Read the above warning once again and understand the full implications.


See Also