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<html lang="en">
  <head>
    <meta charset="UTF-8" />
    <title>Gentoo</title>
    <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css" />
    <style>
      code {
        color: #505050;
        font-size: 10px;
        border: 1px solid grey;
        border-radius: 3px;
        padding: 1.75px;
      }

      pre {
        background: #f4f4f4;
        color: #505050;
        padding: 20px 0px 0px 20px;
        overflow: auto;
      }
    </style>
  </head>
  <body>
    <a style="text-decoration: none" href="index.html"><--</a>
    <h2>Gentoo Linux on Macbook Air</h2>
    This page covers various features, nuances, notes, etc. of my Gentoo system
    running on a 2012 Macbook Air. This laptop was initially bought as a
    tinkering project for $150USD. While this is not the most powerful device,
    it is suitable for all the work I encounter on a daily basis and is used as
    my primary system. My intentions for this system are reliability and speed
    most importantly. With this comes a tidy OS with quite few kernel parameters
    set, fine-tuned USE flags, and a usable system that I'm very familiar with.
    All my configuration can be found on my
    <a href="https://github.com/waffle87/dots/tree/xena" target="_blank"
      >Github</a
    >. <br /><br />
    <img src="data/gentoo/laptop.jpg" alt="laptop image" />
    <img src="data/gentoo/laptop_open.jpg" alt="laptop open image" />
    <br /><br />
    <a href="#hardware_features">hardware features</a><br />
    <a href="#kernel">kernel</a><br />
    <a href="#bootloader">bootloader</a><br />
    <a href="#portage">portage</a><br />
    <a href="#applications">applications</a><br />
    <a href="#miscellaneous">miscellaneous</a><br />
    <a href="#screenshots">screenshots</a>

    <div id="hardware_features">
      <h3>Hardware Features</h3>
      This is a Macbook Air 5,2 (EMC 2559) fit with the following (see
      <a href="data/gentoo/lspci" target="_blank">lspci</a>,
      <a href="data/gentoo/lsusb" target="_blank">lsusb</a>)
      <ul>
        <li>
          Intel i7 3667U at 3.2 GHz with 4 cores (<a
            href="data/gentoo/lscpu"
            target="_blank"
            >lscpu</a
          >)
        </li>
        <li>8 GB RAM</li>
        <li>1 TB NVMe Samsung 970 SSD (used adapter)</li>
        <li>Intel 3rd gen graphics</li>
        <li>
          Broadcom BCM43224 802.11 Network Controller (bcma-pci-bridge driver)
        </li>
        <li>Broadcom BCM2046 Bluetooth</li>
        <li>Broadcom BCM5974 Touchpad</li>
        <li>Keyboard with backlight</li>
        <li>13" 1440 x 900 LCD display</li>
        <li>2x USB 2.0, SD card reader, & Thunderbolt port</li>
      </ul>
      <h4>Modifications</h4>
      Since 2010, Apple Macbooks have used their proprietary SSDs with
      non-standard connectors. When I bought this machine, it came with a 128 GB
      Samgsung "blade" SSD which I was not very keen on keeping. Luckily, there
      exists
      <a
        href="https://www.microconnectors.com/macbook-m-2-nvme-upgrade-adapter/"
        target="_blank"
        >adapters</a
      >
      which simply act as a bridge between a standard M.2 SSD and Apple's
      connector. Installation was quite easy and the adapter has been reliable
      since. This laptop also came with what I presume was the original battery,
      as it lasted about 15 minutes after being charged and would lose power
      randomly. A suitable
      <a
        href="https://www.amazon.com/Replacement-Battery-MacBook-7200mAh-Laptop/dp/B07SDBKDDK"
        target="_blank"
        >replacement</a
      >
      can be found roughly $50USD. With this, I get about 5 hours on a full
      charge, mostly thanks to
      <a href="https://github.com/linrunner/TLP" target="_blank">TLP</a> and
      thermald. Now, if only the memory wasn't soldered directly to the
      motherboard, or I could find the courage to
      <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aH4n9xBaWxg" target="_blank"
        >replace it</a
      >.
    </div>
    <div id="kernel">
      <h3>Kernel</h3>
      After spending many hours narrowing down kernel options enabled, I have a
      7.8 MB kernel image with ~4000 parameters set. Note, this configuration is
      very hardware and user specific. I opted for absolutely zero modules since
      I don't need any out-of-tree hardware support. I also did not configure
      anything very drastically in either direction, like extreme security,
      sacraficing usability, etc. I chose to use
      <a
        href="https://packages.gentoo.org/packages/sys-kernel/gentoo-sources"
        target="_blank"
        >gentoo-sources</a
      >
      to provide kernel source as it contains some handy patches and is easy to
      obtain via emerge. A base 6.7 kernel builds locally (remember, 4 cores) in
      approximately 17 minutes, which is not too much of a pain when
      troubleshooting on bare metal. I also chose to omit an initramfs, which
      means CPU microcode can/should be built directly into the kernel. This can
      be achieved by first installing <code>sys-firmware/intel-microcode</code>.
      This is also a good time to add microcode signature to
      <code>/etc/portage/make.conf</code>
      <pre>
$ iucode_tool -S -l /lib/firmware/intel-ucode/*
iucode_tool: system has processor(s) with signature 0x000306a9
microcode bundle 1: /lib/firmware/intel-ucode/06-3a-09
selected microcodes:
  001/001: sig 0x000306a9, pf_mask 0x12, 2019-02-13, rev 0x0021, size 14336
# echo 'MICROCODE_SIGNATURES="-s 0x000306a9"' >> /etc/portage/make.conf
      </pre>
      CPU's signature is found in bundle 1, so the filename to use is
      <code>/lib/firmware/intel-ucode/06-3a-09</code>. Ensure the following
      kernel options are set approximately, where the argument passed to
      <code>CONFIG_EXTRA_FIRMWARE</code> is the filename of our microcode
      <pre>
CONFIG_MICROCODE=y
CONFIG_FW_LOADER=y
CONFIG_EXTRA_FIRMWARE="intel-ucode/06-3a-09"
CONFIG_EXTRA_FIRMWARE_DIR="/lib/firmware"
      </pre>
      Check dmesg for microcode output to ensure all was successful. My specific
      configuation for this machine can be found at
      <a
        href="https://raw.githubusercontent.com/waffle87/dots/xena/.config/kernel.config"
        >6.7.4 .config</a
      >

      For some more kernel related stuff, see <a href="kernel.html">here</a>.
    </div>
    <div id="bootloader">
      <h3>Bootloader</h3>
      Spoiler: there is none. For the duration of my time using Linux, I have
      used GRUB as my bootloader across various systems. In my experience, it's
      been ok, it does what it needs to, allows for extensive configuration like
      theming and requiring a password. However, some time ago it went kaput and
      despite manually setting the root partition in
      <code>/boot/grub/grub.cfg</code>, it seems the incorrect value was passed
      to the kernel at boot and the partition could not be found. Every time I
      would reboot I would have to manually set it (which is a handy trick to
      know nonetheless)
      <pre>
grub> ls
(hd0) (hd0,gpt0) (hd0,gpt1) (hd0,gpt2)
grub> ls (hd0,gpt1)/
vmlinuz vmlinuz.old
grub> root=(hd0,gpt1)
grub> linux /boot/vmlinuz root=/dev/sda3
grub> boot
      </pre>
      Since this isn't a multiboot machine or anything, I can simply omit GRUB
      and expose the kernel image as an EFI stub. First, the following kernel
      options must be set
      <pre>
CONFIG_EFI=y
CONFIG_EFI_STUB=y
CONFIG_CMDLINE_BOOL=y
CONFIG_CMDLINE="root=PARTUUID=... ro"
      </pre>
      The root must be set to the <code>PARTUUID</code> value of the root
      partition. Use <code>blkid</code> to obtain this Once kernel has been
      recompiled, copy the image to the EFI partition and create a new boot
      entry. It is also wise to remove unneeded entries to conserve space
      <pre>
# efibootmgr -b 1 -B
# cp arch/x86/boot/bzImage /boot/efi/gentoo/bzImage-x.y.z.efi
# efibootmgr -c -d /dev/sda -L "gentoo efi stub" -l "\efi\gentoo\bzImage-x.y.z.efi"
      </pre>
      Reboot and the bootable system should be shown in Mac's EFI program
    </div>
    <div id="portage">
      <h3>Portage</h3>
      <h4>Profile</h4>
      When initially setting this up, I opted for a multilib system as I was
      still using some 32-bit programs at the time. Since, I have switched to a
      no-multilib profile. Unlike adding multilib support to a 64-bit only
      system, going from multilib to no-multilib is quite easy.
      <pre>
# eselect profile list
  ...
  [12]  default/linux/amd64/17.1/no-multilib (stable)
  ...
# eselect profile set 12
# emerge -auDN @world
# emerge --depclean
      </pre>
      It was pleasant to see 60+ packages removed after the switch. And have
      much reduced overhead in my system overall.
      <h4>Compiler</h4>
      As Clang/LLVM has become more and more stable and is able to compile all
      packages installed, I chose to switch the default compiler, linker and
      other bits over from GCC. This is easy enough in
      <code>/etc/portage/make.conf</code>.
      <pre>
CC="clang"
CXX="clang++"
AR="llvm-ar"
NM="llvm-nm"
RANLIB="llvm-ranlib"
      </pre>
      If needed, a GCC fallback environment can be made containing the previous
      variables, then applied to certain packages which may fail under Clang via
      adding an entry in <code>/etc/portage/package.env</code>. Some advantagees
      of using Clang over GCC are slightly faster compilation times and reduced
      memory usage, and potentially safer binaries overall.
      <h4>USE Flags</h4>
      My USE flags and related options are quite minimal. Global flags include
      <pre>
USE="alsa bluetooth clang dbus elogind gles2 jpeg png \
     pulseaudio sdl udev wayland X -systemd -vulkan -nls"
ACCEPT_LICENSE="*"
ACCEPT_KEYWORDS="~amd64"
      </pre>
      For reference, some primary features used on this system are Wayland,
      Pipewire, elogind, and OpenRC. Since no-multilib already has very few
      things enabled, not many flags needed to be disabled.
    </div>
    <div id="applications">
      <h3>Applications</h3>
      Packages in my world file can be found in
      <a href="data/gentoo/pkglist" target="_blank">package list</a>, and list
      of all system packages in
      <a href="data/gentoo/pkglist_full" target="_blank">full package list</a>.
      Some notable utilities I use are below.
      <ul>
        <li>
          <b>Window Manager: </b
          ><a href="https://github.com/swaywm/sway" target="_blank">Sway</a
          ><br />
          To omit the need for a display manager and launch directly from a tty,
          the <code>XDG_RUNTIME_DIR</code> variable needs to be manually set in
          shell startup file (<code>~/.zshrc</code>) Then to launch Sway, simply
          add the following as well.
          <pre>
if test -z "${XDG_RUNTIME_DIR}"; then
    export XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=/tmp/${UID}-runtime-dir
    if ! test -d "${XDG_RUNTIME_DIR}"; then
        mkdir "${XDG_RUNTIME_DIR}"
        chmod 0700 "${XDG_RUNTIME_DIR}"
    fi
fi

if [ "$(tty)" = "/dev/tty1" ]; then
  exec dbus-run-session sway
fi
            </pre
          >
        </li>
        <li>
          <b>Bar: </b
          ><a href="https://github.com/Alexays/Waybar" target="_blank"
            >Waybar</a
          >
        </li>
        <li>
          <b>Launcher: </b
          ><a href="https://hg.sr.ht/~scoopta/wofi" target="_blank">Wofi</a>
        </li>
        <li>
          <b>Notifications: </b
          ><a href="https://github.com/emersion/mako" target="_blank">Mako</a
          ><br />
          Requires <code>x11-libs/libnotify</code> and to be manually launched
          via Sway configuration.
        </li>
        <li>
          <b>Lock Screen: </b
          ><a href="https://github.com/jovanlanik/gtklock" target="_blank"
            >gtklock</a
          >
        </li>
        <li>
          <b>Keyboard Manager: </b
          ><a href="https://github.com/rvaiya/keyd" target="_blank">Keyd</a
          ><br />
          For many months, I used
          <a href="https://github.com/kmonad/kmonad" target="_blank">KMonad</a>,
          which was suitable for most of what I needed, but lacked a couple
          things, namely key combos. I stumbled across Keyd which to my surprise
          did in fact support combos. The
          <a
            href="https://raw.githubusercontent.com/waffle87/dots/xena/.config/keyd.conf"
            target="_blank"
            >configuration syntax</a
          >
          is also incredibly simple. After creating an OpenRC service script, it
          was ready for use. Putting this here as I'm sure I'll need to
          reference it sometime in the future.
          <pre>
#!/sbin/openrc-run
command=/usr/bin/keyd
command_background="true"
pidfile="/run/keyd.pid"
            </pre
          >
        </li>
        <li>
          <b>Terminal: </b
          ><a href="https://github.com/waffle87/st" target="_blank"
            >st (fork)</a
          >
        </li>
        <li>
          <b>Shell: </b
          ><a href="https://github.com/zsh-users/zsh" target="_blank">ZSH</a
          ><br />
          Some command line tools I used along with ZSH include
          <ul>
            <li>
              <a href="https://github.com/starship/starship" target="_blank"
                >starship prompt</a
              >
              which provides some useful UI tools like Git repository status.
            </li>
            <li>
              <a href="https://github.com/ajeetdsouza/zoxide" target="_blank"
                >zoxide cd replacement</a
              >
              which has auto-jump functionality meaning
              <code>cd very/long/long/path</code> can be simplified to
              <code>cd path</code>.
            </li>
            <li>
              <a href="https://github.com/lsd-rs/lsd" target="_blank"
                >lsd ls replacement</a
              >
              which mostly offers useful UI improvments like file type icons and
              empty directories, and extensive configuration.
            </li>
            <li>
              <a href="https://github.com/sharkdp/bat" target="_blank"
                >bat cat replacement</a
              >
              also mostly consists of UI features like syntax highlighting and
              line numbers.
            </li>
            <li>
              <a
                href="https://github.com/zsh-users/zsh-autosuggestions"
                target="_blank"
                >autosuggestions</a
              >
              which allows past-run long commands to be completed by tapping
              right arrow key.
            </li>
            <li>
              <a
                href="https://github.com/zsh-users/zsh-syntax-highlighting"
                target="_blank"
                >syntax highlighting</a
              >
              does exactly as the name suggests; colours available commands in
              green, underlines valid paths, etc.
            </li>
          </ul>
        </li>
        <li>
          <b>Editor: </b
          ><a href="https://github.com/neovim/neovim" target="_blank">Neovim</a>
        </li>
        <li>
          <b>Document Viewer: </b
          ><a href="https://github.com/pwmt/zathura" target="_blank">Zathura</a>
        </li>
        <li>
          <b>Privilege escalation: </b
          ><a href="https://github.com/Duncaen/OpenDoas" target="_blank"
            >doas sudo alternative</a
          >
          is a utility originally written for BSD, but has been ported to Linux
          under the name OpenDoas. Comparatively, sudo contains roughly 150,000
          lines of code, while doas only contains about 4,000. For a personal
          computer like this, doas is more than capable of achieving what I need
          it to. By default, the "persist" feature is not enabled and must be
          set via <code>persist</code>
          USE flag.
        </li>
        <li>
          <b>Screenshots: </b
          ><a href="https://sr.ht/~emersion/grim/" target="_blank">grim</a>
          which can be used with
          <a href="https://github.com/emersion/slurp" target="_blank">slurp</a>
          to allow to select specific regions. This can then be piped to
          <a href="https://github.com/bugaevc/wl-clipboard" target="_blank"
            >wl-copy</a
          >
          to copy the image to your clipboard. I map this functionality to
          keyboard input via Sway.
          <pre>
bindsym $mod+p exec       grim -g "$(slurp)" - | wl-copy
bindsym $mod+Shift+p exec grim -g "$(slurp)"
          </pre>
        </li>
        <li>
          <b>Backlight: </b
          ><a
            href="https://github.com/Hummer12007/brightnessctl"
            target="_blank"
            >brightnessctl</a
          >
          is used to control both screen brightness and keyboard backlight. This
          package is now available in the GURU repository. Ensure
          <code>CONFIG_APPLE_BACKLIGHT</code> and
          <code>CONFIG_SENSORS_APPLESMC</code> are set in the kernel. This
          functionality can also be mapped to the keyboard using Sway.
          <pre>
bindsym XF86MonBrightnessDown exec brightnessctl -q set 10%-
bindsym XF86MonBrightnessUp   exec brightnessctl -q set +10%
bindsym XF86KbdBrightnessDown exec brightnessctl -q --device='smc::kbd_backlight' set 10%-
bindsym XF86KbdBrightnessUp   exec brightnessctl -q --device='smc::kbd_backlight' set +10%
          </pre>
        </li>
      </ul>
    </div>
    <div id="miscellaneous">
      <h3>Miscellaneous</h3>
      Another QOL modification for me was disabling the rather obnoxious startup
      sound present on all Macbooks. To do this, kernel must be built with
      efivarfs support (<code>CONFIG_EFIVAR_FS</code>) and the partition must be
      mounted at <code>/sys/firmware/efi/efivars/</code>. Next, the following
      commands must be run as proper root, not just with elevated permissions.
      Begin by removing the immutable flag from the appropriate file. Mac's EFI
      terminal uses the bell code (<code>0x07</code>) to audibly play system
      messages/warnings. It can be set to null character to silence it. Lastly,
      replace the immutable flag.
      <pre>
chattr -i /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/SystemAudioVolume-7c436110-ab2a-4bbb-a880-fe41995c9f82
printf "\x07\x00\x00\x00\x00" > /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/SystemAudioVolume-7c436110-ab2a-4bbb-a880-fe41995c9f82
chattr +i /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/SystemAudioVolume-7c436110-ab2a-4bbb-a880-fe41995c9f82
      </pre>
    </div>
    <div id="screenshots">
      <h3>Screenshots</h3>
      <img src="data/gentoo/fetch.png" alt="fetch image" />
      <img src="data/gentoo/nvim.png" alt="neovim image" />
      <img src="data/gentoo/gotop.png" alt="gotop image" />
      <img src="data/gentoo/wofi.png" alt="wofi image" />
      <img src="data/gentoo/zathura.png" alt="zathura image" />
      <img src="data/gentoo/lockscreen.png" alt="gtklock image" />
    </div>
  </body>
</html>