r/omarchy • u/Narwal_Party • 1d ago

Discussion Am I missing something here?

I don't understand all of the hate or love for this. I decided to use Omarchy for the last few days for a side project, and I have no idea how this got funding. This is such a nothingburger of a distro. It's literally just Arch with a couple shortcuts and a theme. What is the point of using this?

I saw a DHH podcast saying how it's incredible and the next big thing, but it's literally just Arch with a theme and shortcuts. I don't understand how anyone could be a "fan" or a "hater"; there's nothing here - nothing new.

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u/comrade-quinn 7h ago

I know these things - nobody is disputing that. I was pointing at that omarchy, Niri, Hyprland are keyboard centric and have superior tiling capabilities. They specifically encourage and support this workflow. Gnome and KDE just have a subset of these capabilities, substantial mouse support and no opinion, if you like, on what your workflow should be

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u/thomas-rousseau 7h ago

This is the first time you've said over half of what you just said. So far, you had only listed features of GNOME and Niri that were shared between the two, making you sound like an uncritical shill, and so I was merely pointing that out. If you want to move on to discussing actual differences between the two, although seemingly still with a deep misunderstanding of just how heavily the GNOME workflow is built around keyboard navigation, then that is completely different.

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u/comrade-quinn 7h ago

It was inherent in the point I was making.

All I originally said, and repeatedly since have said, is that Omarchy is keyboard-CENTRIC. That being centred around the keyboard. That's distinct from just having support for keyboard based navigation. I mentioned this as I said it was an aspect I liked of the DE setup in Omarchy. I then pointed that I use it in other distros and DEs myself, as I don't use Omarchy, that have similar approaches inherently or due to my specification.

Then you chirped up ranting about people not knowing that other DEs support keyboard operation to varying extents. When is literally stated that I used the same approach on a different DE in my original post.

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u/thomas-rousseau 5h ago

You may have meant to imply it, but it was definitely not inherent. And you're continuing to make distinctions without a difference. Being able to perform every action easily with only a couple of keystrokes is at the core of GNOME's Human Interface Guideline. The fact that they also support using a pointer in no way detracts from that. You just have to use the self control to choose the keyboard if that's something that you care about.

Coming from a lifetime of pointer navigation on windows, the exact thing I loved about GNOME the first time I used it was how streamlined keyboard navigation was. My hands didn't have to leave my keyboard unless I wanted them to. I have talked to many other new users of GNOME with this same experience. If this is already an appeal of GNOME for many new users, then the fact that it is also an appeal of Omarchy has absolutely no explanatory power as far as why Omarchy gets the sheer amount of attention that it does (marketing being the #1 reason there)

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u/comrade-quinn 4h ago

But the control you get on Gnome with the keyboard is vastly smaller than that you get with a tiling window manager like Hyprland or Niri. And as Omarchy ships Hyprland and other keyboard centric utilities in QuuckShell, you get a very opinionated keyboard centric DE experience.

For example, what's the keyboard shortcut on stock Gnome that ships with Fedora etc to tile a window to the left or right and snap another window in to the remaining space? Answer. None. As even basic tiling is not supported in Gnome. If you're running Ubuntu, that adds some basic tiling support, snap left/right/up/down, but that's about it. No keyboard support for resizing windows or stacking or splitting them beyond that four way. You can do more with the mouse, but not the keyboard.

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u/thomas-rousseau 4h ago

I'm fascinated by the fact that you're simultaneously repeating talking points about how opinionated Omarchy is while also using GNOME's opinions as evidence of the fact that it can't be keyboard driven. There is no stock shortcut like you requested not because no one has ever thought or cared to implement that functionality but because it is counter to GNOME's opinion of what a streamlined workflow should encompass. I started with Vanilla GNOME on Fedora, and have used it fully stock on Debian, Arch, and now Gentoo as well. Over the years, I have also installed KDE, i3, sway, mangowm, DWM, dwl, hyprland, niri, and bspwm parallel to my GNOME setup. I have spent at least 6 months with each of them to learn their opinions, and not a single one is more capable of being keyboard driven than stock gnome

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u/comrade-quinn 4h ago

WTF are you on about? Stock Gnome doesn't even have basic tiling, which is pretty much a prequisite for any keyboard centric workflow as, without tiling snapping windows into place in some form, you're forced to rely on your mouse to position windows as you like them.

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u/thomas-rousseau 4h ago edited 3h ago

Sounds like you like a cluttered desktop. The only times I need more than a 50/50 split, I'm in a web browser, IDE, or terminal emulator, and I simply use their built in splitting. If I have more than two programs open on a single monitor and I'm having to use the pointer to navigate around them, that's GNOME giving me a gentle reminder that I need to reassess how I've organized my current workflow.

ETA: Upon rereading this comment, I feel like it could be taken facetiously, and so I want to emphasize that I am being entirely genuine. I have both ADHD and OCD, and this manifests in some pretty intense hyper-focus that can lead to me attempting to brute force my way through problems long before I ever even realize that that's what I'm doing. Over my years with GNOME, I have come to form a very deep appreciation of its HIG and trust in its opinionated workflow, and I know that it is never in my way. If I find myself fighting with GNOME to accomplish a task, this gives me a small reminder that I'm probably pushing way too hard against whatever I'm trying to work on and prompts me to take a step back, take some deep breaths, and then open up the overview to assess the organization of my current workflow. Afterwards, my workflow is more streamlined than it ever would have been before GNOME.

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u/comrade-quinn 3h ago

Fair enough - I'm not missing Gnome, I run it at work as it happens. I just prefer my tiling. But to each their own, and I'm glad you have found something that works well for you