How I Became an Arch Linux User

My first experience with Linux was in my school's computer lab. That distro was called IT@School, based on Ubuntu. Ubuntu was the first Linux distro name I'd ever heard.

A few years later, I learned about hacking, the whole matrix wallpaper, mask, hoodie-hacker imagery. I got excited. That's when I heard about a second distro: Kali Linux. I got even more excited. I didn't have a PC at the time, so I installed Kali on my phone using Termux.

At that time, I had no idea what Linux actually was, what it was really used for, what servers were, or who Linus Torvalds was.

Slowly, I started stepping into the world of technology. Unexpectedly, I came across a YouTube channel called IB Computing. It was a different kind of channel. Most other tech channels talked about gadgets, phone specs, and things like that. But the owner of this channel, Mujeeb CPY, spoke about technology, especially Linux, in real depth.

By that time, I had a laptop with Kali Linux and Windows set up as a dual boot. After that, I started exploring other Linux distros.

Whatever distro I installed, I would eventually roll back to Windows. That's because I was a graphic designer. Like many designers, I didn't like GIMP. There wasn't really anything for me to do on Linux. Honestly, the only reason I even opened Linux was to customize KDE Plasma.

Later, I started learning programming, and forced myself to actually program on Linux. But KDE Plasma turned out to be the villain there too. I'd end up losing time customizing it instead of coding. Up to that point, I'd used MX Linux, Manjaro, KDE Neon, and Kubuntu. So I decided to switch to GNOME instead.

I liked GNOME. It didn't demand much customization. I could get straight to work. So I started off with Ubuntu, then moved on to Zorin OS.

After a while, I started wanting to actually use Arch. But assuming the installation would be too difficult, I installed EndeavourOS instead.

I only used EndeavourOS for a short while. By then, I'd already decided to install Arch itself. I followed a YouTube tutorial and installed it successfully. It wasn't nearly as difficult as I'd imagined.

At first, I used Arch with GNOME. Since I love minimalism, once I learned about Hyprland, I decided to try it out. There's been no looking back since. These days, Arch Linux, Hyprland, and LazyVim are my everyday tools. The only time I use Windows is for design work, because I still haven't found a proper open-source replacement for Photoshop. I'm not chasing open-source purity for its own sake; I just use whatever gets the job done best.

If you're curious, you can check out my dotfiles and try my Arch Linux setup yourself. It's nothing feature-rich. It's just a very minimal setup, built to stay out of my way.