Just Enough Shell

Built for everyday use, not for screenshots.

Who is JES for?

• Desktop PCs with FHD+ resolution (the author uses UWQHD)
• Users of SwayFX / Hyprland / Niri / DriftWM, or enthusiasts willing to invest time in initial setup (the shell itself works on any WM, but keybinds and tiling config won't be included)
• Those who value performance and architecture over trends
• Anyone who wants a pleasant, CPU/GPU-lightweight interface

If you fall into this audience — welcome. If not — this project might not be for you, and that's okay.

-- IMPORTANT -- :

• Nvidia graphics cards work TERRIBLY, everything can freeze instantly for no reason, the author is not going to fix this issue, because it's problems on the driver side!
• The author has no experience with Arch Linux; installation on Arch may be incorrect. If that's the case, please describe the issue in an Issue and, if possible, suggest a fix.
• Installation instructions are at the very bottom.
• The author is open to suggestions and helps with onboarding; for issues, open an Issue.

If you want live video wallpapers, there are both video wallpapers and shaders available
(the latter may work poorly with JES's auto theme generation)

Wallpapers from screenshots: click

JES structure

-- What you can configure in JES -- :

• wm — auto, but for WMs not in the supported list you need to specify the name with a capital letter
• wm_type — auto, but for unsupported WMs choose between workspaces or coordinates
• mainRad — corner radius, default 10, works best in the range 0–25
• barOnTop — control bar on top along with adjacent widgets, enabled by default
• minibar — constrains the bar width to 1920px, disabled by default
• BarHeight — bar height, default 30
• fontSize — font size, default 17
• fontFamily — font, default Mononoki Nerd Font Propo
• custom_wallpaper_engine — disable the built-in wallpaper engine, default false
• disableGenerate - replace JES matugen theme on base16, default false
• doNotDisturb — silent mode, default false
• timezone — the city for the weather widget; it is not present by default, the value is taken from the user-config.toml file of the NixOS configuration.

Note: config.toml lives in the Quickshell folder (~/.config/JES/)
The author left an alias in .bashrc — if you don't want to type the path, just run:
    jes-cli editConf
The alias uses micro; to quit press Ctrl+Q, to save press Ctrl+S

JES for DriftWM

-- Keybindings for SwayFX, Hyprland and Niri -- :

• To open the plugin center, right-click on the power button.
• To open the calendar, right-click on the time; left-click swaps the time and date.

The screenshot key is configurable since not everyone has a convenient Home key — the author's keyboard doesn't have Print Screen either.

Keybindings for DriftWM

-- How JES looks -- :

Desktop

Control bar (DriftWM version differs, see DriftWM_eng.md)

Wallpaper picker

Player

Power buttons

fastfetch

Volume / audio popup

App launcher

Lock screen

bash prompt

1 [02:00 - orflem:~]$  cd gits/just_enough_shell/
2 [02:00 - orflem:~/gits/just_enough_shell main]$  

command number, time, user, directory, git status (when inside a git-tracked project)

-- Plugins -- :

Installation

1. open ~/.config/JES/
2. drop the plugin folder there
3. open config.toml
4. add the following lines:
   [[plugin]]
   name = "plugin name" # data in property name from manifest.json
   active = true

Detailed plugin creation guide

Plugin Repository

Important: the repository is only available in English, as this part is heavily influenced by the project community, and translating all short descriptions into multiple languages is extremely difficult.

-- Installing JES -- :

NixOS clear

• Install NixOS
• run the installer:

nix-shell -p git --run "git clone https://github.com/ORFLEM/just_enough_shell.git && cd just_enough_shell && ./install.sh"

• select full installation
• reboot with reboot

NixOS develop

• Install NixOS
• run the installer:

nix-shell -p git --run "git clone https://github.com/ORFLEM/just_enough_shell.git && cd just_enough_shell && ./install.sh"

• select installation of JES only
• add to imports ./JES.nix and in the config

services.jes = {
  enable = true;
  users = [ " your user" ];
};

• rebuild the system with the desired parameters
• reboot with reboot

NixOS flake

• in flake specify the following:

{
	inputs = {
    jes.url = "github:ORFLEM/just_enough_shell";
	}
	outputs = { your inputs, jes, ... }@inputs:
  let
    system = "x86_64-linux";
    hostname = "nixos";

    specialArgs = { inherit inputs system hostname; };

  in {
    nixosConfigurations.${hostname} = nixpkgs.lib.nixosSystem {
      inherit system specialArgs;
      modules = [
				jes.nixosModules.default
			];
		};
	};
}

• rebuild the flake
• in configuration.nix specify

services.jes = {
  enable = true;
  users = [ " your user" ];
};

• rebuild NixOS

Arch Linux or Arch-based (may be incorrect; if so, please open an Issue)

• Install Arch Linux (EndeavourOS is recommended for simplicity)
• Start the installer:

git clone https://github.com/ORFLEM/just_enough_shell.git && cd just_enough_shell && ./install_arch.sh

• In case of errors, install manually:

1. Install Arch Linux (EndeavourOS is recommended for simplicity)
2. Install yay or paru (yay: git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/yay.git && cd yay && makepkg -si)
3. Install official packages (sudo pacman -Syu && pacman -S $(cat ./installer/arch_official.txt))
4. Install AUR packages (yay -S $(cat ./installer/arch_aur.txt))
5. Install the zenburn theme for Qt and GTK
6. Optionally configure system themes (GTK/Qt) to zenburn and install the ter-v32n font
7. Back up user configs (cp -r ~/.config/ ~/backups/ && cp ~/.bashrc ~/backups)
8. Copy files from ".config/" to "~/.config" and from ".local/" to "~/.local" (cp -r ./.local/* ~/.local/ && cp -r ./.config/* ~/.config/ && cp ./.bashrc ~/.bashrc)
9. reboot

-- License -- :

Notifications were taken from the blxshell project and improved both visually and partially technically. License: GNU GPL v3. Worth checking out.

These configurations are distributed under the GNU GPL v3 license.

In plain terms:

• You are free to use, study, and modify this code.
• If you share your modifications or derivative work with others (e.g. by publishing a fork), you must make your source code open and available to everyone under the same license.

This ensures that all improvements and derivative works remain free and open, just like the original.

Full license text: LICENSE.

Created by _ORFLEM_