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Table of Contents
openSUSE basic usage
Installation process tl;dr
Install options to deblote!! It is also worth concidering getting rid of Discover altogether and favor Myrlyn and Bazaar.
- Install system with EN (UK)
- In the installer\*, on the final screen before installation starts, change security to AppArmor
- Click on “Software”, which will bring up a package selection screen
- Untick “KDE Applications” pattern (assuming you chose the KDE desktop when the installer asked previously, but it should be the same logic if you chose GNOME or Xfce)
- Re-tick “KDE Base” pattern (this gets unselected in the step above)
- Then click on “Details” and install a few more packages, I would suggest “spectacle” for the KDE screenshot program, “konsole” for the KDE terminal (otherwise you just get xterm) and “discover”. Read more below.
- Install
- Remove zypper hook from Discover
- Move Flatpaks to user space
- Add swap
Flatpaks
Flatpaks are installed in root.
To move to user space:
sudo flatpak list
- Make a note of apps.
sudo flatpak remote-delete flathub
flatpak remote-add --user --if-not-exists flathub https://flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpakrepo
- Reinstall apps.
flatpak install ...
Not needed, will be pulled in when needed: `flatpak install org.freedesktop.Platform`
Or just accept that they are in root. Bazaar forces it. Discover however, does not!!
Discover
Always update with commandline!!!!
sudo zypper dup
To that end, it's advantageous to remove zypper hook into Discover. Native packages should not be updated with it and notifications become useless:
sudo zypper remove -u PackageKit-backend-zypp && sudo zypper addlock PackageKit-backend-zypp
Possibly this is needed aswell:
sudo zypper addlock discover6-backend-packagekit
Regarding bloat
Even if installing debloated, patterns can force back installs later on. Locks are needed.
sudo zypper addlock MozillaFirefox
Decoration
Ned Aurorae by jomada. or
sudo zypper in oxygen6
Steam permissions
Context menu
Install to fix context menu of Steam in the tray:
sudo zypper in libdbusmenu-qt5-2-32bit
AppArmor
Fuck SELinux and install AppArmor instead.
SELinux
sudo zypper in selinux-policy-targeted-gaming
To be able to start games?
However that one is already installed. So:
- temp fix:
sudo setsebool selinuxuser_execmod 1
- perm fix:
sudo setsebool -P selinuxuser_execmod 1
However it only seem to be semi temporary. https://en.opensuse.org/Portal:MicroOS/SELinux
Permanently disable it in Grub
Swap
The default 2 GB can easily be filled, causing freezes with 16 GB RAM. Add more swap and use zswap!
Add/change swap (btrfs)
sudo btrfs subvolume create /swap sudo btrfs filesystem mkswapfile --size 8G /swap/swapfile sudo swapon /swap/swapfile
Make permanent by adding a row in `/etc/fstab`
/swap/swapfile none swap defaults 0 0
Change the swap file size:
sudo swapoff /swap/swapfile sudo rm /swap/swapfile sudo btrfs filesystem mkswapfile --size 16G /swap/swapfile sudo swapon /swap/swapfile
Swapfile will be added to the total swap (including partitions) seamlessly by btrfs.
zswap
Compresses before storing in RAM. When RAM is full, decompresses and store on disc. This is recommended. Add to bootloader parameters using YaST:
zswap.enabled=1
More detailed but mostly unecessary:
zswap.enabled=1 zswap.compressor=lzo zswap.max_pool_percent=25
zram
Do not mix with zswap! zram is an older way of using compressed RAM as swap, not recommended anymore.
sudo zypper in systemd-zram-service systemctl enable --now zramswap.service
Upgrade NVidia drivers
Note: Make sure there's a password for root!! Mokutils (for NVidia w/ secureboot) asks for root password!!
Note: Use Myrlyn! 580-packages needs to be removed one by one since it was not installed from the start using meta package. Install 595 meta package. From now on it will also be easier to switch.
https://sndirsch.github.io/nvidia/2025/07/16/nvidia-drivers.html
nvidia-smi
For some reason, some games doesn't detect NVidia card unless nvidia-smi is run in the terminal.
Best work around is to create a call of `nvidia-smi` as an autostart .desktop file.
~/.config/autostart/wake_nvidia.desktop
[Desktop Entry] Comment=Runs nvidia-smi Exec=/bin/sh -c nvidia-smi '>' /dev/null '2>&1' '&' Hidden=false Name=nvidia-smi NoDisplay=false StartupNotify=true Terminal=false Type=Application
Migrate rolling release plan (TW/Slowroll)
I have had bad luck with this. Would recommend reinstalling altogether.
https://en.opensuse.org/Portal:Slowroll
sudo zypper in opensuse-migration-tool sudo opensuse-migration-tool --dry-run sudo opensuse-migration-tool sudo reboot
