A story telling to save me from a therapist consultation.

No space square world. I realize that that this could be my theme philosophy. This is my general approach:

  • windows manager: tiling (bspwm)with no spaces, squared windows, no decorations, no visual effects
  • theme: transparency and grey background buttons/white text

Over two decades I went from a fancy looking machine to its complete opposite where minimalism is king. How did I make such a big jump?
To make it brief, recreating this comfort look that invaded my real environment felt reassuring at first in my virtual life. But as time went by I noticed that smooth rounded stuff that transiently showed up on my screen created:

  • more and more distraction and negatively impacted my productivity
  • some frustration when something didn’t run as expected because I felt that everything should be as smooth as the appearance of my screen

I would definitely say that I feel way better now and I’m more efficient but I also admit that I’ve reached an extreme where:

  • I don’t appreciate screens over 14" anymore because I feel like it’s taxing on my eyes movement and again a waste of space
  • I don’t like wasting a pixel of space if not justified. This is also maybe influenced by preference for small screens
  • I need extreme simplicity (which brings efficiency) to all aspects of my workflow. So I use a 36-key split keyboard, a trackball, vim-like keybindings everywhere possible, use terminal as much as I can, use fzf for all my file searches…

Hope you will never end up like me but nice to have friends in this group if it’s too late for you ^^

  • Oliver Lowe@hachyderm.io
    1·
    10 months ago

    @friend_of_satan @wwwgem That got to me too the more I used Linux. BSD (OpenBSD specifically) clicked much more for me. Not that it’s any less customisable, but the BSD culture tends towards favouring defaults and refining existing software rather than limitless configuration and novelty. I’ve generalised here but I do have this kind of feeling.

    • www-gemOP
      4·
      10 months ago

      I can see that. I’ve tried OpenBSD before Linux as well. One of the reasons I feel good using Linux is that you can go as crazy or as minimalist as you want. And all along this spectrum you can choose the same level of options but the way you chose them will make you build the system you want for your own needs and liking. As long as the options exist but are not installed or activated by default, I like having the choice (which also means the choice to not use them). It also help me build a consistent system where all my tools can freely interact together (and again the way I want to).

      I don’t want to have to comply to the way a developer decided I should use something.

      At the end of the day we’re lucky to have the choice in the OS that fits us the best. And most importantly we can evolve and make a switch if we ever feel the need for it :D Like distro in Linux I find it stupid to claim that one OS is best that another. I hope this post didn’t give that impression. What’s best is what’s meet your needs.

      • Oliver Lowe@hachyderm.io
        4·
        10 months ago

        @wwwgem Totally agree! :) One of the coolest things about Linux for me is learning about all the different approaches to systems and applications.