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Systemd-sysext Help Needed (lemmy.world)
submitted 1 day ago by filister@lemmy.world to c/linux@lemmy.ml
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I am running Bluefin immutable distro and I would like to test Niri. I found on the net that the cleanest way is to use systemd-sysext and I have managed to install Niri using the community extensions.

Now I would like to install Dank Material Shell, and it has a couple of pre-requisites and I am clueless how I can add them again with systemd-sysext.

I tried to look for additional information, but found very little on the matter. Do any of you have experience with this?

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[-] MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip 1 points 11 hours ago* (last edited 11 hours ago)

Yeah, the main reason i gave up on immutables. Fine for "computer is a hammer" users but a hassle for tinkerers like myself. On a normal distro, it's just

  1. install niri
  2. edit config
  3. run niri

My advice: figure out your tooling, then build a custom image (if you dare to). And if you're the kind of person who wants to change something "system" again in a month or two, give up on either of the two.

[-] priapus@piefed.social 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I'm not super familiar with sysext, but from my understanding, you'd need to create an additional sysext to include, or find an existing one for DMS (I couldn't find one).

Your other options would be using rpmtree or a custom image. Theres already a few images out there that are based on Bluefin with Niri + DMS added.

Tbh I'm recalling struggling to find good documentation for sysext. Asking in the ublue discord will probably get you better answers.

[-] CsXGF8uzUAOh6fqV@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

I have no clue but I do have a question. If you want to mess about with window managers and ricing them (I like that as well), wouldn't a non immutable distro be easier? It is "immutable" but it seems you want to mutate all kinds of stuff.

[-] filister@lemmy.world 0 points 1 day ago

That's a great question. I like the concept of more stable OS and I played a bit with NixOS in the past but ultimately decided that it is too much of a hassle to learn Nix to use it and decided to try Bluefin. I am actually overall content as I was able to install the missing packages either in Toolbox/Distrobox or using homebrew.

By the way I have actually found a way, and rebased my OS to another immutable flavor. I know that's more of a workaround.

[-] just_another_person@lemmy.world 0 points 1 day ago

Gotta say... This is not how you'd generally do any of this. Where you get this info?

[-] nobody_1677@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

It's not how you "generally" do it because many immutable distro developers keep developing additional ways to do package management that are more and more complicated.

I still don't get why we can't have a BSD like approach. Make usr, bin, sbin read-only. But have /usr/local be writable and have a traditional package manager install to that location instead.

[-] j0rge@lemmy.ml 1 points 6 hours ago

Bluefin maintainer here, you've described how Bluefin works except it's ~/.local/bin.

I am pretty sure we have not been developing package managers lol.

[-] CsXGF8uzUAOh6fqV@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

I think that's because the user can still fuck up their system by doing some stuff to those user files, like not managing their packages correctly. Note that for normal users anything that messes up their user experience equates to messing up "the system". But I don't really know, it's just a guess. I just run a normal distro where you can mess with everything (like god intended lol).

[-] nobody_1677@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

That's not the reason. On immutable distros, you can still mess up your flatpak packages, distrobox containers, homebrew packages, etc.

Only "OS" files like those in /bin prevent accidental modification and removal since you cannot directly change them, even with root.

[-] eldavi@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 day ago

On immutable distros, you can still mess up your flatpak packages, ... homebrew packages ...

wait: there's immutable versions of macos?

[-] nobody_1677@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

MacOS's has been immutable for a while now. But that's not what I was referring to. Homebrew also works on Linux, lots of CLI tools and libraries are available there. It does have some GUI apps, but not as many packaged as for MacOS.

[-] eldavi@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 day ago

i was aware that homebrew works on linux, i just assumed people would use apt/dnf/guix/whatever since it seems superior to me; but then again, i hardly ever touch homebrew besides my employer provided mac.

what applications does immutable macos have?

[-] nobody_1677@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

We are discussing immutable distros, where you don't have apt/dnf/guix/whatever installed on the host system. They are replaced with other package managers. On Ubuntu Core, that is snap. On Fedora Atomic, that is rpm-ostree, flatpak, and toolbox.

MacOS is immutable, there is no non-immutable version.

this post was submitted on 07 Feb 2026
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