> I believe that Sway will be the key to mass Linux desktop adoption...
I'm curious what the basis of this thinking is. Sway looks like a nice i3-like tiling window manager for Wayland, but I don't see how such a piece of software would make so much of a difference.
I used Windows primarily for over 20 years. I experimented with dwm back in 2006 and really enjoyed the idea. Something clicked in my brain a while back and I tried Arch Linux. It took a lot, and I mean a lot of stubbornness on my part (and on Arch) for me to figure out how to get a minimalist desktop with just about everything working. Now that I do though, it is very easy and simple to understand. I really don't need any bloat and my OS is pretty much portable at this point, and I have great software to do pretty much everything I want.
My computer isn't terrible, but it is much older. I've got external monitors connected to it. Using i3 just feels natural at this point. I definitely feel more efficient. I have everything integrated that on Windows requires compatibility layers.
My passwords are stored using Pass, so I can even use latest encryption. I use browserpass for password integration. I've got integrations in rofi for Chrome tabs. I mean, the simplicity and speed make using a computer exciting and enjoyable for me.
If I were using a VR or AR device, I don't want to manage location of items. I like technology helping me and not getting in the way. This is what I think a properly optimized and configured desktop could be like, and I haven't ran into any issues. I can even watch YouTube and other streaming services natively and with graphics acceleration using mpv and youtube-dl.
With this framework, we won't need Android for mobile and Vulkan integration isn't too far away. I feel like with a little creative thinking, that tiling window managers can be whatever you want them to be.
Now take GTK/Gnome or Qt/KDE + X11, which are a strong learning curve for UI development, and bloated upon dependencies galore (some of this is just poor packaging) and evaluate how much of that codebase is actually producing quality applications to win the Desktop space for Linux.
You have 2 (some would argue 3 or more) commercial Linux distros that have been unable to do so, and now partner with Microsoft. I see developers flocking towards JavaScript because that is being pushed as the solution for UI development.
There is a reason that Linux desktop is failing, and I believe that tiling window managers help solve that.
No offense to Mozilla or Chrome teams, but damn your browsers are bloated and unnecessary. I can't wait for chopsui or whatever else the right scripting language is to come along and sweep it all up, because that is what will happen. Sorry Microsoft, but your 4GB OS will be blown away by something that will probably clock in at less than 1GB with Wayland/Vulkan.
Now wrap that into container isolation, and you've got yourself a policy framework.
I really don't recommend running a Windows or Mac VM simply for compatibility, because then you lose out on a bunch of perks, but you can. I mean you can use something that is free and the source code is available for rich and poor people alike, and the web is full of information and communities to help you get started and prosper from your new open source skills and education. Or you can pay for spyware and then pay more to supposedly protect yourself from spyware, while installing more spyware to make you safer, and then you will need adware for that spyware, and then some additional apps to make sure that you only install OS-approved spyware.
Well, you had to admit that with auto-complete, it is pretty cool to just type a couple letters and tab your way to heaven. Have you tried Rofi? There are some descent themes, but in all honesty the terminal is great. It is a text-based dynamic solution which makes it extremely versatile and compatible.
What is more natural than just typing and tabbing to what you want? That is some simple voice navigation stuff as well, or once you get to VR, then tab-complete can be like auto-suggest.
Have you seen Vim with perfect horizontal, vertical windows, and re-scaling? I have, and it is glorious! Once you add proper icon font support and Airline, it is hard to beat... yes, Neovim is probably better.
However, it is a matter of time before chopsui or another UI toolkit comes along that will essentially wrap around all these great terminal applications in a way that will create the layouts and styling that web users are mostly used to. I hope instead though that, it is more general, and that information is decoupled from design. Instead, I hope that sites will be able to request to change layouts, and that we will build better decentralized marketplaces for developers.
I'm curious what the basis of this thinking is. Sway looks like a nice i3-like tiling window manager for Wayland, but I don't see how such a piece of software would make so much of a difference.