Bubbles - lightweight Linux working environments

Quick, yet Full-featured:

• Starts an instance in just a few seconds
• Access to a real Debian installation

Persistent, yet Disposable:

• Run long-living environments: Separate distinct contexts persistently, while not cluttering your host
• Run quick experiments: Do not break your host, break your Bubble and discard it

Integrated, yet Isolated:

• Wayland windows are managed on the host compositor, Networking is transparent
• Using sub-sandboxing plus strong KVM isolation boundary

Powerful, yet Unprivileged:

• Run containers effortlessly within a Bubble
• Bubbles runs as sandboxed, least-privilege Flatpak on any modern Linux (Opinionated distributions like Fedora Atomic and NixOS included)

Immutable, yet Mutable:

• Includes Nix to enable version-controlled, reproducible work environments
• If Nix is too strict, fall back on Debian's apt or install any other package manager

Screenshots

Getting started

Download the flatpak file for the latest app-v* release from releases.

Install it:

flatpak install --bundle $HOME/Downloads/de.gonicus.bubbles.flatpak

Run

Start "Bubbles" via desktop, then:

1. Press image download button, await completion
2. Press VM creation button, enter name, confirm
3. Start VM, await startup and initial setup
4. Press Terminal button
5. Enjoy mutable Debian+Nix Installation
6. (Optional, yet recommended: Setup Nix home-manager, see "Cheat Sheet")

The installed system is a Debian Trixie with preinstalled...

• Gnome Console (kgx)
• Nix
• sommelier
• starship (configured for nerdfonts)
• bubbles-agent (simple agent for serving needs of the UI)

On first boot, it will fetch a nerdfont.

Cheat sheet

Quick bubble creation

Not a requirement, but using btrfs does seem to apply CopyOnWrite to disk images, so Bubble creation is quicker.

Install home-manager (recommended, it's worth it)

$ /opt/home-manager-bootstrap init
$ /opt/home-manager-bootstrap switch
# Home Manager is initialized!
$ vim ~/.config/home-manager/home.nix # Add packages from nixpkgs
$ home-manager switch

Change default terminal

• sudo update-alternatives --config x-terminal-emulator

Enforcing Wayland

• Chromium: chromium --ozone-platform=wayland
• VS Code: code --ozone-platform=wayland

Comparisons

Compared to distroboxes...

Pro Bubbles:

• allows straight-forward use of containers
• provides isolation

Contra Bubbles:

• not as host-integrated as distroboxes

Compared to devcontainers...

Pro Bubbles:

• allows straight-forward use of containers (hence also devcontainers)

Contra Bubbles:

• not part of devcontainer ecosystem

Compared to allround VM solutions like Gnome Boxes...

Pro Bubbles:

• does not require stepping through OS installers
• opinionated networking etc.
• allows Wayland integration

Contra Bubbles:

• does not support traditional VM handling use cases

Using the work in...

• crosvm + sommelier
• Relm4
• rust-gtk4
• passt
• distrobuilder
• Gnome Console
• ...