this post was submitted on 15 Sep 2026
24 points (92.9% liked)

Linux

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A community for everything relating to the GNU/Linux operating system (except the memes!)

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Original icon base courtesy of lewing@isc.tamu.edu and The GIMP

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Click here to download it.

  • What it is

A minimal, windows 95-esque application launcher... with fancy directory icons over binary name suggestions, mouse support (you can doubleclick a binary name to run it) and a real-time clock on the far right.

  • Why

Nostalgia... and a (very likely) "futureproof" likeness (If both X11 and wayland gets ditched/replaced for whatever reason... this will still work as intended.). Also, due to how it works on both X11 and wayland regardless of whatever you have installed. Yes, distro hoppers -- I heard your plea. :')

  • Dependencies

Type "sudo apt install build-essential libsdl2-dev" if you are on Debian/ubuntu

  • How to compile

After downloading and extracting the tarball,

make -j$(nproc)

It'll create a "notwin95" binary.

Then run it with ./notwin95.

  • How to install

Type "sudo cp notwin95 /usr/local/bin/.".

  • Commands

Arrow keys (up/down/left/right) or mouse left click to navigate between suggestions. Press enter (or mouse double left click) to run a binary. Press ESC to quit.

  • Notes

I've tested this on a orange pi 5 max and the CPU usage was pretty much nil. So I'm sure all of you will have no problems/issues running it.

  • License

This is under the "DO WHATEVER YOU WANT" license. Should be self-explanatory.

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[–] unquietwiki@programming.dev 2 points 3 days ago

Upvoted because its neat, but the distribution needs work: you have a TAR file in the GZIP, not labeled as a TAR file, so it's hard to tell at first what/how you're supposed to access this.