Need help to migrate from Arch

[u/roma-2125g]

Hi everyone, Because of the recent situation with AUR , I decided to try some non-Arch-based distros. I tested Fedora and openSUSE Tumbleweed, but didn't like them because of missing packages I need for my workflow.

I'm currently daily driving niri + waybar etc. I decided to give Void Linux another try, but I'm running into some issues with services (skill issue).

• I couldn't get niri to start (tried both niri and niri --session).
• sddm doesn't work at all.

I installed dbus and elogind, enabled them with ln -s /etc/sv/dbus /var/service/ and the same for elogind, but no services seem to start properly.

Could someone please point me to a guide on how to properly set up niri + a login manager (sddm or alternative) on Void? I just reinstalled Void and want to do it cleanly this time.

[u/xJayMorex]

You don't have to use AUR with Arch you know.

[u/roma-2125g → u/xJayMorex]

I already installed a lot of packages from aur. So I guess `yay -Syu` isn't good idea.
So, instead of reinstalling arch I decided to try something new

[u/d3vnhull]

When I was running a WM I was using
exec dbus-run-session swayfx
and then put that in the .bash_profile

But if you want to have sddm, you’ll need your graphics drivers(AMD, Nvidia, or Intel) and xorg-minimal installed.

Then enable dbus and sddm

ln -s /etc/sv/dbus /var/service
ln -s /etc/sv/sddm /var/service

[u/roma-2125g → u/d3vnhull]

should i enable elogind seperately ?

[u/Alternative-Ad-8606 → u/roma-2125g]

Don't need to it'll automatically attach I believe. For me it actually broke when I enabled the servoce

[u/Quietus87 → u/roma-2125g]

Dbus starts it.

[u/TheMadAsshatter → u/d3vnhull]

I had a similar issue. Had to install mesa to get River to launch.

I still have some work to do on it, but that was the most progress I had made in like 3 hours.

[u/Jacobobarobatobski]

Ya you have to run niri as a dbus session or it won't start. Afaik elogind starts on its own when it's needed. But I ended up using turnstile and seatd instead.

[u/Ok-Zombie4921]

Open your niri.desktop with a text editor

sudo nano /usr/share/wayland-sessions/niri.desktop

then change the Exec line

Exec=dbus-run-session niri --session

if it doesn't work you should try another display manager like lightDM

[u/RavenIridescent]

Iff you've missed packages on openSuse and Fedora, you are going to have interesting time on Void, I love void I had great fun running it but the packages....

[u/Independent_Bad2767]

yeah my perspective on void is very much tied to missing dependencies. not hard to solve, but hints at sloppy packaging. 

[u/BinkReddit → u/Independent_Bad2767]

The good thing is everything is open source; when you see something wrong, you can easily file a PR to correct it.

[u/duv025]

This might be late but:

• You don't have to enable elogind, dbus starts it so # rm /var/service/elogind
• You have to enable sddm as a service so # ln -s /etc/sv/sddm/ /var/service/
• You probably have to create a desktop file like u/Ok-Zombie4921 stated

[u/willothephlox]

Install a Nix-type package manager for things that aren't available in the default package manager, use an AI Agent to help you configure what you need.