Cover the shell, capture, browsers, and networking in the manual

Add chapters for the top bar and its panels, screenshots and recording,
toggles/idle/screensaver, browsers, shell plugins, and networking, which
collects the Wi-Fi, DNS, firewall, and Tailscale material that was spread
across the FAQ, TUIs, and services chapters.

Fill smaller gaps in the existing chapters: user hooks, autostart, menu
extensions, printing, power profiles, factory reset, drive and user
passwords, passwordless sudo, firmware updates, display text size, and
the LocalSend share menu.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
This commit is contained in:
David Heinemeier Hansson
2026-08-13 17:04:09 +02:00
co-authored by Claude Fable 5
parent 144f4d1e31
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# Getting Started
Omarchy is installed using an ISO. You can choose between a full-disk install, which takes over the entire drive, or a free-space install, which puts Omarchy in the unallocated space on a drive — that's how you dual boot alongside Windows or another OS (see [dual-boot install](44-dual-boot-install.md) — note that you'll need to turn off BitLocker in Windows first). Either way, the installation uses full-disk encryption, and the full-disk option will wipe the selected drive, so be sure to take a backup before using an existing one!
Omarchy is installed using an ISO. You can choose between a full-disk install, which takes over the entire drive, or a free-space install, which puts Omarchy in the unallocated space on a drive — that's how you dual boot alongside Windows or another OS (see [dual-boot install](50-dual-boot-install.md) — note that you'll need to turn off BitLocker in Windows first). Either way, the installation uses full-disk encryption, and the full-disk option will wipe the selected drive, so be sure to take a backup before using an existing one!
[Download the Omarchy ISO](https://omarchy.org/) first, put it on a USB stick (use [balenaEtcher](https://etcher.balena.io/) on Mac/Windows or [caligula](https://github.com/ifd3f/caligula) on Linux), and boot off the stick.
@@ -24,9 +24,15 @@ The full-disk encryption won't allow you to enter the password from a Bluetooth
If you're setting up a machine for someone else — a family member, a new employee, a buyer — you shouldn't be answering the personal questions on their behalf. Hit `Ctrl + C` on the very first screen of the installer (the keyboard selection), and Omarchy will offer to prepare the machine for another owner instead. The system installs right away, but all the personal setup — keyboard layout, username, password — is deferred until the machine boots for the first time. The drive is still encrypted by default, and the password the new owner picks on that first boot becomes the encryption password too.
### Passing on a machine you've already used
If the machine is one you've been using yourself, you don't have to reinstall it to hand it over. Run _Setup > Reset Computer_ in the Omarchy menu, type `reset` to confirm, and reboot. That wipes every user account and everything in `/home`, throws away all the packages and system changes you made since installation, and clears the machine's identity — network connections, host keys, and all. What comes back up is the setup wizard from the first boot, ready for its new owner to enter their own name, password, and encryption password.
It works by restoring the baseline snapshot the installer takes, so it's only available on machines installed from the Omarchy ISO. And on a drive without encryption, a reset is deletion rather than a secure erase, so if the data was sensitive, do a fresh install instead.
### Unattended installs
The ISO can also install completely on its own — no keyboard, no wizard — when it's handed its configuration on a second drive. That's the way to treat Omarchy as a base image for VMs and fleet machines. See [unattended installs](45-unattended-installs.md).
The ISO can also install completely on its own — no keyboard, no wizard — when it's handed its configuration on a second drive. That's the way to treat Omarchy as a base image for VMs and fleet machines. See [unattended installs](51-unattended-installs.md).
### No-encryption installations