GNOME is the default desktop of Chimera.
Installation
The easiest way is to use the base-desktop
metapackage.
# apk add base-desktop
This adds gnome
as well as several things a desktop session
will typically want, including graphics drivers.
It is possible to install those things individually for more
fine-grained control. Those users may also be interested in the
gnome-core
package which only installs a relatively bare desktop
without auxiliary apps.
GNOME on Xorg
While it is possible to start GNOME on Xorg either via .xinitrc
and so on or via GDM, it is recommended to use Wayland. GNOME on
Xorg has been known to have issues with Xorg and certain accelerated
graphics drivers, so if you encounter issues such as the shell
hanging on early startup, that may be the cause. The Wayland session
is known to be stable.
Starting
Keep in mind that GNOME requires elogind
. In a typical setup, this
is enabled by default, i.e. requires explicit masking to avoid. You
do not need to manually enable elogind
if you have not removed
its service link. Likewise, it requires dbus
, both system and
session bus, see D-Bus.
You can start GNOME either manually, or from a display manager, typically GDM.
Manual startup
For Wayland (recommended), all you need to do is log in on your desired tty and run:
$ gnome-shell --wayland
For X11, you can create an .xinitrc
script, and put the following
inside:
gnome-session
Then you need to give it appropriate permissions (must be executable
by your user). Then you can simply use startx
.
Note that starting GNOME without GDM will disable some functionality. Most notably, this is the lock screen.
Display manager
Select the X session you want.
GDM
GDM is the recommended way to start GNOME, and it can be used to start other desktops and window managers as well.
Typically, all you need to do is enable the service:
# dinitctl enable gdm
That will make it start on every boot. If you want to run it just once, you can also do:
# dinitctl start gdm
After that, you only need to log in and a desktop should come up.
GDM with Xorg
Normally, GDM will default to Wayland. There are some specific cases where Wayland is disabled, most of them not relevant to Chimera, but e.g. when missing modesetting.
Other people may want to disable Wayland manually for other reasons.
To force-disable Wayland in GDM, edit the /etc/gdm/custom.conf
file
and uncomment the WaylandEnable=false
line.
Note that this will not make GDM with Xorg work right away, as Chimera’s Xorg setup is unprivileged and the X server started by GDM will not be allowed to switch VTs, see Xorg.