Mint i3 Setup — "Omarchy-like" desktop on Linux Mint 22.x

A reproducible i3wm desktop (launcher, browser, file manager, transparency, wallpapers, Nerd Font bar, zsh + Powerlevel10k) layered on top of a stock Linux Mint 22.3 "Zena" (Xfce) install, without touching the Xfce session.

• OS: Linux Mint 22.3 (Xfce), Ubuntu noble, X11
• WM: i3 4.23 (as a separate login session)
• Compositor: picom 10.2
• Launcher: rofi 1.7.5
• Shell: zsh 5.9 + Oh My Zsh + Powerlevel10k
• Font: Hack Nerd Font

The Xfce session is left intact as a fallback — pick i3 from the session menu at the login screen (LightDM).

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Files in this folder

File	Purpose
setup.sh	One-shot installer/reproducer for a fresh Mint install
KEYBINDINGS.md	Full list of shortcuts/keys
README.md	This summary

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What setup.sh does

1. Installs packages: i3-wm i3status rofi picom feh xss-lock xautolock, alacritty, light-locker, xfce4-power-manager, network-manager-gnome, blueman, xfce4-screenshooter, zsh git curl wget unzip, plus x11-xserver-utils, pulseaudio-utils, flatpak, and the OCR/capture tools tesseract-ocr tesseract-ocr-eng maim slop xdotool xclip libnotify-bin.
2. Installs Hack Nerd Font to ~/.local/share/fonts/HackNerdFont.
3. Writes all config files (see inventory below) — auto-detects your network interfaces for the status bar.
4. Backs up any existing config to ~/.i3-mint-setup-backups/<timestamp>/.
5. Installs the Flatpak apps LocalSend and ONLYOFFICE Desktop Editors (user-scoped, from Flathub).
6. Installs Oh My Zsh + powerlevel10k + zsh-autosuggestions + zsh-syntax-highlighting, and applies the compact git prompt tweak.
7. Removes Xfce's Super-key shortcuts (so they don't hijack i3's keybinds via xfsettingsd).
8. Sets zsh as your login shell.

Usage

cd ~/i3-mint-setup
bash setup.sh
# then: log out and pick the "i3" session at the login screen

Run it as your normal user (it calls sudo when needed, so you'll be prompted for your password). Re-running it is safe (idempotent).

Options:

bash setup.sh --no-packages   # skip apt install
bash setup.sh --p10k-only     # only (re)apply the Powerlevel10k config + compact git tweak

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Config inventory (what gets written)

Path	Contents
~/.config/i3/config	i3 keybinds, colors, gaps, autostart, bar
~/.config/i3/transparency.sh	opacity up/down/toggle/reset/global/restart
~/.config/i3/wallpaper.sh	wallpaper pick/random/restore/list (feh)
~/.config/i3/power-menu.sh	rofi power menu (lock/suspend/logout/reboot/shutdown)
~/.config/i3/screenshot-ocr.sh	Omarchy-style screenshot → tesseract OCR → clipboard
~/.config/i3status/config	bar modules with Nerd Font icons (auto interface names)
~/.config/picom/picom.conf	85%/80% opacity, shadows, fading, blur disabled
~/.config/rofi/config.rasi	rofi modi: drun, run, window
~/.config/alacritty/alacritty.toml	Hack Nerd Font Mono 11
~/.config/gtk-3.0/settings.ini	GTK3: Mint-Y-Dark + Papirus-Dark
~/.config/gtk-4.0/settings.ini	GTK4: Mint-Y-Dark + Papirus-Dark
~/.gtkrc-2.0	GTK2: Mint-Y-Dark + Papirus-Dark
~/.zshrc	Oh My Zsh, plugins, theme, p10k source
~/.p10k.zsh	Powerlevel10k "lean" + compact git segment

Applied via xfconf (for the Xfce session): /Net/ThemeName=Mint-Y-Dark, /Net/IconThemeName=Papirus-Dark.

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Key design decisions / notes

• i3 is a separate session. Xfce is untouched and still selectable at login.
• rofi instead of dmenu (dmenu is not in Mint's enabled repos).
• picom 10.2 supports blur but not rounded corners (needs picom 11+).
• Blur is disabled = "pure transparency" (no frosted/acrylic background). Transparency: active windows 85%, inactive 80%.
• xfsettingsd runs under i3 for live GTK theme changes. Because it also loads Xfce's keyboard shortcuts, this script clears Xfce's Super bindings — otherwise grabbing the bare Super key would swallow every Super+… shortcut before i3 sees it.
• i3-msg reload does not restart i3status; use i3-msg restart to reload the bar config (plain exec lines only run on first start, so restarting doesn't duplicate the applets).
• Media/brightness: brightness keys are commented out until brightnessctl is installed.
• The status bar uses Nerd Font glyphs; the interfaces (enp3s0/wlp2s0 on the original machine) are auto-detected by the installer.