A desktop built on Arch Linux · Pre-alpha
Takumi
For people who are done with macOS and Windows. Updates you can undo, windows that never pile up, and one place to find anything.
Moving through themes shows each one on the whole desktop before you choose it. Closing the Palette puts yours back.
One place for everything
The Core and the Palette
There is no menu bar, dock, taskbar or settings app. At the bottom of the screen sits the Core: a small capsule that names the window you are in, the time and what is on. When something happens, it widens to say so.
Press Super+Space and it grows into the Palette. Type part of a name and press Enter: an app, an open window, a setting such as bluetooth, a sum, an emoji, something you copied earlier. An app you don't have yet shows as “Get” and installs just for you, without a password. Click the marks on the right for Quick settings; click the clock for Today.
Rows that change something ask in place: “Press Enter again to shut down”. Nothing opens a terminal to do an everyday job. More about the Core
Updates you can undo
Rooms
An update never changes the system you are using. Takumi copies it, updates the copy and starts the copy the next time you restart. Each copy is called a room, and the old one stays.
- You choose when. Type
updatein the Palette. Nothing restarts your computer while you work. - The new room is prepared beside yours. You keep working; your files are not touched.
- Restart to move in. The new room starts.
- If it doesn’t start, the next start goes back to the last good room by itself and tells you, with nothing lost. If you just don’t like it, “Go back to the previous system” in the Palette does the same.
Windows sit side by side
The strip
New windows open next to each other on a strip that goes on as far as you need. They never cover one another, and opening one never shrinks the one you were reading. You slide along the strip with Super+← →, see everything with Super+O, and make a window wider with Super+R.
There is no layout to learn. If you can scroll a page, you can use it. The strip runs on niri. Windows on the strip
The keys your hands know
Harmony
Super is the Command key: the one with the Windows logo, or Command on a Mac keyboard. Copy, paste, undo, save and the rest mean the same thing in every app, the terminal included, because Takumi sets them once at the keyboard itself.
| Mac | Windows | Takumi | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Copy, paste, undo | ⌘ C V Z | Ctrl C V Z | Super C V Z |
| Find anything | ⌘ Space | Win | Super Space |
| Everything you copied | an app | Win V | Super P |
| Emoji | ⌃ ⌘ Space | Win . | Super . |
| Screenshot of a part | ⌘ ⇧ 4 | Win ⇧ S | Super ⇧ 4 or S |
| Lock | ⌃ ⌘ Q | Win L | Super L |
A screen that follows the day
Themes and the Sky
A theme colours everything at once: the Core, your windows, the terminal, the editor and the sky behind them. Each one has four phases, so the colours warm at dawn and sink at night on their own.
Fifty-five themes come with Takumi, light and dark: Takumi’s own, led by Ion, and the community palettes people already use. Type theme and move through them; each one shows itself before you choose. Themes and the Sky
And the rest of a computer
Wi-Fi in the Core
Type a password right in the list; a wrong one is known in seconds. Give a visitor your network with a code their phone scans.
Quick settings and Today
Switches, sound and capture under Super+I. The month, timers and what apps said earlier under the clock.
Screenshots without an app
The picture shows in the Core, a press away from opening. Record the screen, pick a colour, copy text off the screen.
An encrypted disk
One password from start to desktop, and a recovery code in case you forget it. Nobody who takes the laptop gets your files.
Something is wrong
Type it. Takumi checks Wi-Fi, sound, space, updates and the clock, fixes what is safe and says what it did.
An assistant that asks
Intent, on Claude or OpenAI, acts only through Takumi’s own commands and asks before anything risky. Nothing is sent until you set it up.
Nothing phones home
No account, no tracking. Takumi goes online for updates, the weather you asked for and the assistant you chose.
One command for all of it
Every row in the Palette is a takumi command you can read and run. If you can see it, you can script it.
Erase and give away
One row resets the computer for its next owner, who chooses their own password and gets their own recovery code.
Where it stands
Takumi is at version 0.1.0 and runs in a virtual machine today: the setup disc, the desktop, rooms and rollback, the Core, Wi-Fi, sound, displays, power, encryption and fifty-five themes. Some parts, like Bluetooth and firmware updates, are built against stand-ins for the real hardware.
Next comes real hardware, laptops first. There is no setup disc to download yet; this page will say when there is. The full story is in the guide.
Install
From the setup disc: start the computer from a USB stick, answer five questions and it installs, with no network needed. Or, on a computer that already runs Arch Linux:
The setup disc isn’t out yet. The one-line install works today and fetches Takumi from GitHub; it is pre-alpha, so use a computer you don’t depend on. Installing, step by step · Read the script
匠 (takumi) is Japanese for a master craftsman. The skies in the scene above are the Ion, Sakura and Ember themes’ own pictures. Takumi is free software under the MIT licence, made by Bakari Mustafa. Questions or ideas? Email bakari@bakarimustafa.com.