Through pain.
It’s generally always described as a seamless adaptation. This is absolutely true until you actually get into it! But the pain comes in from a totally unexpected angle!

My very first Linux distribution to use was Fedora with Gnome desktop. That was aeons ago really. And if I remember correctly, the last version of Windows I used, might have been 7. The next update (if I am not mistaken) was supposed to be an upgrade to 10.

To be absolutely truthful here, the first steps were not taken because of huge concerns about privacy at all, nor because of the freedom to choose what lives in one’s computer. There was talk of course. Because No 10 promised absolutely uncontrollable telemetry and updates that were forced right then and there. But I cannot say I understood the whole thing really. I was mostly excited to try something else and this whole thing just provided a really comfortable excuse.

I had a HP laptop at that time, No 7 on it was legit and all. That was probably the fanciest computer I had really owned up until then. Before that I had quite a few computers. My first were all sorts of remnants I had gathered from here and there. They were really old. One of them was a laptop that had Windows NT on it. Then I bought also a very used but a little bit more modern looking and behaving set. With a monitor and all. That was the first time I could burn a CD (at home)! The towers grew…

That computer served me for quite a while. Until I got a job as a project manager in my family member’s firm and I got a really nice ThinkPad as a work-gear. The desktop computer got passed on to my younger family member.

Of course I had seen Linux before. At the very same workplace we had a few older machines that were in a very nice condition really. But the newer the Windows, the lesser amount of computing was somehow left, so we tried Linux. Nothing fancy - Ubuntu or Fedora. The solution was at first a bit frowned on, as the buttons were not there, they were elsewhere and it needed a very small bit of change in habits. I am happy to say, eventually it worked out. At least as long as I was there.

Now, remember I told you before the countless sidequests that I had a HP laptop at the time I was about to make the change? Well, time had passed. I did not work at that firm anymore. I got that laptop as a hostage.

Again, some years passed and now we’re at the point where Windows 10 is not too optional anymore, as No 7 loses all the support or upkeep it ever had. So Fedora with the Gnome desktop it was!

Not too much later I had gathered enough goldens to buy a nice new desktop computer. That was my very first computer that was new, that I owned and had quite nice resources in it too. A family member helped me to build it (read: he took the time to choose the parts and then attached them all into a working thing into the very nice new box). And a brand new nice flat screen monitor too. To confess everything, my goldens fell a bit short of course. But I had already obtained a video card (as a generous gift) from a family member who was updating gear. Though that component was pre-loved (and it was loved, not just used), it was a very good one.

Windows has never lived in this machine. And nor has it since taken place in others I have today.

Fedora with Gnome desktop was the first install onto this box too. I loved the roundness of Gnome. The whole thing looked and felt like I was on a starship battlestation in a distant future! I wanted to go through the installing process by myself of course. And at the time it wasn’t really very tricky - get the live image and roll it! The thing got my hands shaking a bit when it was time to get Nvidia working with Linux. At that time it was a looooong manual to go through, most of it done in console. No, I was not so friendly with that route. And it was really scary! Scary, because I didn’t understand it and I was genuinely worried that if I took one wrong turn (misspelled one little thing), then I would ruin absolutely everything! Forever!
And yes, I probably would have had to repair something or redo things - but I lacked the understanding that it can be helped. Most probably. I did not fathom that everything may be modded to one’s liking and thus - anything could be also repaired.

Beginning Of The End

Well, yes, it is a journey. One does not just jump from standard Fedora to Void. Or does one?

No, I did not. At one point Gnome desktop got really laggy for me. I do not know why. The fault might very well have been between the chair and the computer too.

It was years ago still and at that time KDE was considered much more resource hungry than Gnome. And resources I had! I noticed that one of my friends at that time was using Manjaro and since the desktop lagging was anyway bothering me, I decided it was time to distro-hop too. Why not!? After all - it seemed like a reliable source to me too as that friend of mine happened to be a programmer. That one wouldn’t choose a shitty distribution, would he? He did not use KDE of course. He had something much lighter going on in there, LXDE I think.

And then I had many happy years on Manjaro with KDE. That time taught me, that I like sets. When I already have a KDE desktop, I absolutely need the f*****g calendar besides my clock to show me my tasks, todos and whatever’s on it. So it’s not going to be Thunderbird, right? No. It has to be KMail. The whole suite of course, to be exact. Kontact with the calendar, addressbook and whatnot.

Now one has to understand, that this is not the question if I really needed all of that. But I really hate broken things or stuff that does not work as they’re intended to. And this is where things began breaking apart. I have no idea today, years later, if and how the Kontact-thingy is working. The last time I was on KDE, still looking for solutions, advancements in getting all those nice things working, I noticed they had started new projects for mail, calendar and that gave me notice, that Kontact is probably not going anywhere for much longer. It was a huge project too, of course. Very ambitious.

All I know is that I’ve at least once lost all my mail somehow within it. The documentation for this absolutely gorgeous and beautiful startup was surprisingly scarce. Nor did the forums provide much help. So just by not knowing really, trying out this and that, I most likely, deleted the whole reservoir of my mail and calendar equally from my computer and server by just tinkering within the settings. The bad thing was, I was quite dependent on all the mail I had. I still am.

So I was largely disappointed in KDE too in the end.
While I was on Gnome and I got first glimpses of Evolution, I was so excited. I had it set up just right. I had all the inbuilt “text snippets” in place, signatures, search-folders… That was an amazing tool too. And I think it actually was a better solution than KDE’s Kontact. From the point of someone who would really like the whole promised land to appear. If only I didn’t get that mysterious Gnome-lag. But later it became widely discussed, that it wasn’t only me - the lagging Gnome. For a while at least, but I had already moved away.

One never takes a step back, right?

You Have Entered The Void

One of my very good friends has a passion for Linux. This is what I advertised in the beginning - that installing linux could become actually a social activity. We actually were on this journey I have described together. Up until this point I had very much only one point on my mind - I really needed to get things done, while he had time and resources to play around and even think a little in between.

And good thing he did - my friend, the thinking.
So here I was - dissatisfied with the accord all the widgets and gadgets of my shiny desktop eventually played - I was so ready for a next roll.

So we sat down on one nice day and kept at it until neither of us had any life within. I could not get Void working. It just did not boot and that’s that. Whatever we got wrong, cause we went through the installation and all, the thing did not boot. I ended up in Calculate Linux. And a few weeks later on Devuan. Still running KDE as a desktop, so in my workflow nothing really changed. But the gears behind it had taken already a different form.

So while we spent time together, installing linux, discussing this and that, I had some glimpses over his desktop. I also paid more attention to the thoughts he had gathered over the years while hopping, trying, building.

I do not know, if the stars were finally aligned right, bursts from Sun came from the suitable angle towards us or was it the fact that I moved in between these occasions, the next attempt we made, we succeeded. I had entered the void.

Mind Shift

Scary and hard, I decided for i3. I have never looked back.

I genuinely thought that when I turn on my computer next time, alone, I would really not know how to operate it. I was so wrong. I am a big fan of written notes too. I noted a lot. I almost didn’t need them.

At that time we played it safe - put the thing on my desktop with elogind (which one would like to avoid if one does not believe in systemd).

Since then I have (by myself, alone) installed Void onto my two other machines without elogind, but used seatd and turnstile. Some additional configurations are needed but things work beautifully. I might try to put the prospect of my process of going this route up here too soon.

The several attempts to get Void to stick actually gave more confidence. The process obviously seemed more and more familiar every time. The locations and the importance of files and what does what became clearer and clearer. Also the understanding, that if one writes something into this file and it does not work out, one may change it.

The power of maintaining and deciding of your own system. Responsibility too. But the know-how, as always, comes with time and experience.

You already know, that I am the perfect example of someone who needs something working and right now. So the very mainstream live-image, and when you like what you see, the simple install, is a very good starting point. You might have other wishes than I - the things that push you further, to look for more. Follow them then, preferably when you’re not really ready but have already experienced that you need changes.

You’ll end up like me - on i3, reading mail using Claws Mail and trying to find time either to explore Mutt or - hoho, Emacs.

Today I have everything much better set up on my i3 than I ever had on Gnome or KDE. I have a key sequence to display calculator, calendar, summon browser profiles listing, mail application or to order/reorder the windows on my screen. They are just at my fingertips - and this sounds like a lot, but it really isn’t. Because you may make up the sequence to be whatever is logical for your mind and brain. Also, you’re quite free to choose whatever applications you like. Nothing is built in. Absolutely no built-in distractions that might not behave as intended! And I get to make up my own bars - bottom or top or whatever, containing the data I choose to be there!

So for me the pain was always there! There was always the UI or UX that predicted what would be the most intuitive way for me to handle a thing. It was wrong. That was the pain.