Believe it or not, there are people who actually miss the Windows 8 interface. One enthusiast liked it so much that they decided to recreate the Windows 8 Metro user interface for Linux systems. I tried it, and it’s easily the most janky-but-lovable graphical interface I’ve ever seen.
This is purely a passion project
The closest you can get to a Windows 8 experience on Linux (without making it yourself)
When Windows 8 came out, I had used Windows 7 and XP for years. It felt really fresh and modern. I didn’t realize that most people hated Windows 8 until years later. So I tried it again recently to see if it really was that bad. In hindsight, I can see why. It’s probably why I feel nostalgic for Windows 7, but never Windows 8. Still, it had some good ideas. The OS felt more “alive” with its elaborate animation effects and live tiles. This Win8DE shell brings some of those good ideas to Linux.
The developer specifically states they missed the Windows 8 animations the most. And having tested it, the animations do seem to be the most polished aspect of the whole shell. The shell works on top of Wayland compositors like Hyprland or Labwc.
Once you install it, it’ll provide you with a new start menu that looks and feels like Windows 8. There’s no taskbar or Charms bars included in the shell, but you do get a Windows 8-style lock screen and on-screen display (volume, battery, and brightness indicators). There’s even a basic settings app where you can configure colors and gestures.
How to set it up
You’ll need Arch Linux and Wayland
The developer has tested and configured it for Arch Linux, so that’s what I’m using to try it. They’ve also included a handy shell script for installing it on Arch systems.
If you want to try it on other distros, you’ll need to manually install the right dependencies and then build it from source. It won’t work on X11 systems though.
If you want to follow along, you can spin up an Arch Linux virtual machine to test it. You could also run it on a bare metal installation of Arch. Just make sure you have a Timeshift snapshot in place. That way you can go back to your original desktop environment, if you need to.
If you’re creating a dedicated VM, I suggest using the archinstall script to set up Arch Linux with Labwc (it’s a featherweight stacking window manager). I only tested it with Labwc, but apparently the Win8DE script supports other Wayland window managers too. At any rate, Labwc is included in the archinstall script, so it just takes a single click to install (pick seatd for managing permissions.)
For a virtual machine setup, animations will be limited without GPU passthrough, so configure your VM accordingly.
Start by opening a terminal (you can do so on Labwc with a right-click anywhere). Then clone the GitHub repo. You might need to install git if you used archinstall to set things up.
git clone https://github.com/er-bharat/Win8DE
Then cd into the Win8DE directory. You’ll find a dependencies.txt file, which lists all the dependencies the shell requires. Install them using pacman.
sudo pacman -S --needed -
When all dependencies are in place, simply run the Bash script that automatically installs this desktop shell.
./install.sh
To remove it later, you can use the ./uninstall.sh script.
Before rebooting, you’ll need to manually add the Win8DE binaries to the Labwc autostart config. Create a new directory to save labwc dot files.
mkdir -p ~/.config/labwc
Then use a text editor to create an autostart script. Run this command to create and edit the script with the nano editor.
nano ~/.config/labwc/autostart
Paste in the following commands.
Win8Start &
Win8OSD-client &
Win8OSD-server &
Win8Wall &
Save the new autostart config. You can press Ctrl+O and Enter to save it with nano. Then press Ctrl+X to quit nano.
The script doesn’t install a special display manager, but the repo does include a Windows 8 theme for the SDDM greeter. You can apply it manually if you like.
Then reboot or log back in to see the changes.
A quick tour of the WinDE desktop
A little rough around the edges, but I can see the appeal
After rebooting, you’ll see a Windows 8-style lock screen. You can press any key to swipe it away. Then you’re dropped into the Start Menu, which is blank by default, except for the ‘All Apps” button at the bottom. You can click it to open the Apps menu. This is another full screen menu where you can right-click on app shortcuts to pin them to the Start Menu.
Coming back to the Start menu, you can navigate and scroll through the full screen menu with keyboard keys. You can adjust the size of the tiles by right-clicking on them (just like on Windows 8.) You can even enable live tile previews. The launch animations are easily the most impressive and faithfully recreated aspect of the whole shell.
My super key wasn’t launching the Start menu by default, so I had to set a different keyboard short to call the Win8Start binary.
The profile icon on the top lets you open a minimal settings app. Here you can set the wallpaper images for the desktop, lock screen, and the Start menu. You can also change the default colors for the tile shortcuts and their backgrounds.
- Operating System
-
Ubuntu Linux 22.04 LTS
- CPU
-
13th Gen Intel Core i7-1360P
- GPU
-
Intel Iris Xe Graphics
- RAM
-
16GB DDR5
A testament to the freedom and customizability of Linux
Linux is endlessly customizable, and this desktop shell proves that you can truly make it look and feel like anything you want. The only limit really is your imagination.
Stephan is the sports journalist for the Maple Grove Report.
