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The Future Is Niri

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Re: The Future Is Niri

#141

Post by mmgutz »

75902846575 wrote: post #135
mmgutz wrote: post #134

Niri is RAM efficient. I run Niri in an 8GB VM on Intel Macbook, and on a $99 8GB mini PC. Total RAM usage on boot is less than 400MB with waybar, polkit, ssh-agent, mako ... That's in the ultra lightweight WM category. Compare that to Gnome+paperwm (1.6GB) There are features Niri sorely needs: 1) 2D overview (zoom in/out), 2) enhanced meta for windows (to create window indicator [1] and window picker)

We're calling 400MB RAM usage ultra-lightweight now? OpenBox needs 7MB of RAM, and there are WMs that are even lighter on memory requirements. > Compare that to Gnome+paperwm (1.6GB) Anything seems lightweight if you compare it to a DE well known for its bloat.

Niri doesn't use 400MB by itself, that's the entire memory footprint of everything running. In comparison, OpenBox with all the utilities needed for wallet, ssh agent etc is in the 450MB range on my box. That's probably due X11 vs Wayland.

A minimal Niri functional environment is similar to IceWM in RAM usage. I used to run antiX in VMs.

Re: The Future Is Niri

#142

Post by bikitan »

bilekas wrote: post #6

> The worst "street-cred" I have is that I've been using tiling window managers for thirty-five percent of my life: five years with Sway and two with i3. As the realization of those numbers (and my age) dawns upon me The author is ~21 and seems worried they're old ? I had a good giggle about that.. And then it dawned upon me how old I actually am.

At the same time, the author refers to things like "decades" of muscle memory and finishing "all of college." I wonder if there's just an error somewhere?!

Re: The Future Is Niri

#143

Post by arp242 »

75902846575 wrote: post #135
mmgutz wrote: post #134

Niri is RAM efficient. I run Niri in an 8GB VM on Intel Macbook, and on a $99 8GB mini PC. Total RAM usage on boot is less than 400MB with waybar, polkit, ssh-agent, mako ... That's in the ultra lightweight WM category. Compare that to Gnome+paperwm (1.6GB) There are features Niri sorely needs: 1) 2D overview (zoom in/out), 2) enhanced meta for windows (to create window indicator [1] and window picker)

We're calling 400MB RAM usage ultra-lightweight now? OpenBox needs 7MB of RAM, and there are WMs that are even lighter on memory requirements. > Compare that to Gnome+paperwm (1.6GB) Anything seems lightweight if you compare it to a DE well known for its bloat.

> We're calling 400MB RAM usage ultra-lightweight now? OpenBox needs 7MB of RAM, and there are WMs that are even lighter on memory requirements.

My WM uses 1,158K of RAM, or basically just a bit above 1M. This is a very minimal custom thing I wrote years ago that works for me.

But the previous person said "total RAM usage on boot". I was curious enough to reboot: on boot my Linux system uses 310M. That's without Xorg and starting only some very minimal services. After startx it uses about 405M.

"RAM usage" is a tricky topic. I have 32G on my machine and there's no memory pressure at all on boot, so the kernel can just allocate/cache stuff "just in case", but it doesn't necessarily need all that memory to allocate.

Re: The Future Is Niri

#144

Post by klardotsh »

I could have word for word written almost exactly this blog post, that's how dead-on-accurate I find it, and how similar OP and I's experiences are (down to when and why we originally switched to Sway - mixed DPI long before Wayland was really "stable" for a daily driver).

Niri is incredible, and has completely eliminated the mildly infuriating bin-packing and layout-optimization problems that TWMs exhibit, without sending me back to the floating WM dark ages. I wish Niri had existed like 10 years ago, but I'll accept it existing now as plenty good enough.

Re: The Future Is Niri

#145

Post by aquariusDue »

sureglymop wrote: post #136

I just use gnome with pop-shell (though on arch). Been using it for years and never had issues with it. For me it's always felt nicer to have a tiling wm on top of something like gnome.

I too used to use pop-shell a few years ago while using PopOS but for the past 6 month or so I've felt great running Ubuntu 24.04 with the PaperWM Gnome extension.

While Niri might be easier to install on Arch I would still suggest giving PaperWM a try for a week. I ended up missing it waaay too much after disabling it for a few days on a whim and now I can't imagine using a computer without a scrolling WM given the choice.

Just uhh... Keep a keybindings cheatsheet nearby, like the one in the PaperWM GitHub repo.

Re: The Future Is Niri

#146

Post by LawnGnome »

klardotsh wrote: post #144

I could have word for word written almost exactly this blog post, that's how dead-on-accurate I find it, and how similar OP and I's experiences are (down to when and why we originally switched to Sway - mixed DPI long before Wayland was really "stable" for a daily driver). Niri is incredible, and has completely eliminated the mildly infuriating bin-packing and layout-optimization problems that TWMs exhibit, without s…

I could also say the same, including the Wayland origin story. I'm pretty new to Niri — I only started playing with it about a month ago — but it's just absolutely that little bit more than Sway I didn't know I needed.

Re: The Future Is Niri

#147

Post by klardotsh »

75902846575 wrote: post #135
mmgutz wrote: post #134

Niri is RAM efficient. I run Niri in an 8GB VM on Intel Macbook, and on a $99 8GB mini PC. Total RAM usage on boot is less than 400MB with waybar, polkit, ssh-agent, mako ... That's in the ultra lightweight WM category. Compare that to Gnome+paperwm (1.6GB) There are features Niri sorely needs: 1) 2D overview (zoom in/out), 2) enhanced meta for windows (to create window indicator [1] and window picker)

We're calling 400MB RAM usage ultra-lightweight now? OpenBox needs 7MB of RAM, and there are WMs that are even lighter on memory requirements. > Compare that to Gnome+paperwm (1.6GB) Anything seems lightweight if you compare it to a DE well known for its bloat.

> We're calling 400MB RAM usage ultra-lightweight now? OpenBox needs 7MB of RAM, and there are WMs that are even lighter on memory requirements.

How much is your X server process using? Because a Wayland compositor has to be both the display server and the WM in one. Comparing OpenBox alone to Niri is incomplete and incorrect, you have to compare OpenBox+Xorg+(xcompmgr or whatever frame-perfect compositor) to get a 1:1-ish comparison.

Re: The Future Is Niri

#148

Post by bayindirh »

tasuki wrote: post #74

I use Gnome and basically full-screen all my windows. Sometimes I use win+left/right to create a half-width window. Am I a caveman?

I use a similar setup on KDE. I generally let windows float, but do half/half or quarters when I need a "command deck" for working on a something.

That thing works for me. Horses for courses, YMMV.

If that's being a cavemen, I'm a proud one at that.

Re: The Future Is Niri

#150

Post by cycomanic »

the_gipsy wrote: post #8

I would like to know, coming from a traditional tiling window manager, how does the shortcut workflow look like? For me the number one thing is having fixed shortcuts á la Super+[0-9] to go to specific windows / workspaces / essentially a specific program. If I can have that, and additionally solving the "worskpace management" problem as TFA described, I'm sold! Does it make sense to use "workspaces" like this with N…

You can also try out niri (really paperwm) like tiling in sway (papersway) or hype (hyprscroller). I'm using the later, and it works essentially the same as regular tiling (you can have named workspaces). That said, I notice that I have a lot of muscle memory due to previously working within the constraints of traditional tiling (i.e. You need a new to switch to a new workspace if you open more than 3 terminals, at least on my monitor). I therefore often switch to a new workspace when I really don't need to and get somewhat confused by where things are. I sometimes think a clearer break from my previous way of working might be easier.

That said I really like the approach to tiling from niri and others. It eliminates pretty much all downsides of tiling WMs IMO

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