Garuda Linux, an Arch Linux Derivative Focused on Snapshots and Gaming

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In this post, we're going to take the opportunity to introduce Garuda Linux, a distribution of Indian origin based on Arch Linux that officially launched in 2020. It is distinguished by its unique aesthetic finish, the use of the well-known Calamares as the installer, and the default use of the Btrfs filesystem to utilize the snapshot feature, which is managed with the Snapper tool.

Recently, Garuda Linux "Birds of Prey" was released, which not only updates the supplied software but also stands out as the first release to include KDE Plasma 6 in the Dr460nized edition. As a result of this, we find many new features that were announced at the end of February when the latest major version of the desktop was officially released. The Garuda Linux team has mentioned improvements in Wayland, which is now the default session, partial support for HDR, and better support for touchpad gestures.

The transition to KDE Plasma 6 required work to replace certain plasmoids and update the Garuda System Maintenance tool to function on the mentioned desktop version. One detail to note is that the aesthetic finish is highly customized, quite different from the usual KDE lines. This is typical of the nature of free software in general and Plasma in particular.

In addition to KDE Plasma 6, Garuda Linux "Birds of Prey" provides updated versions of the window managers Sway and Hyprland, both Wayland compositors. For the former, Greetd has been replaced by ReGreet as the graphical session manager, SwayFX has been added to enable graphical effects, and Waybar has been revamped to update its appearance, while for the latter, various aspects of the distribution's specific configurations have been modified.


Garuda Linux, some of the main features of the distribution. To start, there is a strong commitment to Btrfs because this filesystem natively supports snapshots, which is further enhanced by the ability to select them from the GRUB menu. On the other hand, it uses the Zen kernel, a derivative of Linux noted for performance enhancements and supposedly better suited for contexts like gaming, a sector Garuda significantly targets.

The release in question includes version 6.8.7 of the Zen kernel, accompanied by systemd 255 and the traditional package manager, Pacman 6.1. Garuda Linux is not only offered with KDE Plasma, Sway, and Hyprland but also with Cinnamon, GNOME, the i3 window manager, KDE lite (which provides a more vanilla experience without much extra software), and Xfce, so users have a wide variety of options to use the system with the graphical interface they prefer. Being based on Arch Linux provides Garuda with a technological base that is quite well-known in the Linux world.

Those who want to know all the details about Garuda Linux "Birds of Prey" can consult the official announcement and release notes, while images of the systems are available from the official announcement or from the download section of the distribution's website.



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