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Top Nitrux Applications (Maui) Everyone Should Try
This article showcases some of the excellent Maui native applications that come as default in Nitrux OS Linux distribution.
What are Maui Apps and Nitrux OS
Nitrux is a Linux Distribution and a complete operating system based on Debian with the power NX Desktop, which uses KDE Plasma and Mauikit components. It is one of the most beautiful Linux distributions today, giving you the best looks and performance.
Nitrux is powered by its native Maui applications, specifically designed to work in Nitrux and all form factor devices – a proper form of convergence. That means these Maui applications can run on mobile devices running KDE Plasma mobile OS and desktop Linux while their functionality remains the same.
Note: Some of these applications can run in Android OS as well.
This article would like to showcase the following Maui applications installed as default in Nitrux OS.
Top Nitrix Applications – based on Maui Components
Index – File Manager
Perhaps the most used app in Nitrux OS is the Index, its default file manager. The Index File Manager looks slightly different from traditional file managers in Linux, such as Dolphin or Nautilus.
The user interface is neat and clean. The icons are menu options are well organized and visually expressive. It supports advanced features such as split view open in terminal options. The sidebar is a little different with its icon-based grid options, and there is an option to auto-hide the sidebar.
I would not detail the usual apparent features, such as zoom in/out or view modes. They are similar to the other popular file managers in the Linux ecosystem.
Some of the unique features I must highlight are as follows.
The built-in Terminal option is one of the best features to quickly check certain items or do some basic processing if you wish while browsing the file system.
Another feature I like in this File manager is the preview option of the files. You can preview images, text files, videos and PDFs without opening them.
Finally, a unique feature that I believe none of the other File managers currently have is the overview section. The overview section gives you an excellent summary of your file system, with favourites, image thumbnails and search options. This gives you quick access to your files, and you don’t need to always go to the usual directory browsing mode.
Nota – Text Editor
The Nota is a general-purpose and straightforward text editor. The user interface is clean and concise. That helps you do your development work or allows you to take any quick notes in a much faster way.
Thanks to the Maui kit, the terminal window option is built-in. If you wish to open a terminal and do some essential work during any workflow, you can do that without leaving the text editor window.
Other features that make it a most desirable text editors are –
- Syntax highlighting
- Plugin Support
- Go to the Line number option
- Share and Favorite option
- Autosave
- Supports dark and light themes
This text editor reminds me of the great Gedit, which is not a default editor anymore in GNOME. Gedit has all the featuresof this text editor via plugins.
Vvave – Music organizer
The next Nitrux OS app we would like to feature here in this list is Vvave. This is a music player with full music management features. It can discover music in your local system, network, or cloud services such as Nextcloud.
Although it is a music player, its primary purpose is music management. You can create playlists, tag your music files and so on. The user interface has several views with album arts, search features and album-only views.
Clip Video Player
The Clip is the convergence video player for desktop and mobile phones that supports the Maui kit. It is a simple video player that supports limited hardware decoding and playing from internet streaming services. The Clip video player is based on the MPV video player. All the usual features of a video player are supported in Clip.
Quick features of Clip
- Local, network and internet streaming playback (limited)
- Hardware decoding
- Tagging of videos for management
- Subtitles support
- Based on the MPV video player
Station – Terminal
The Station is a terminal application and my favourite Nitrux application based on the Maui kit. Thanks to the default convergence support, this terminal application can work well on Plasma-based mobile phones.
It brings a friendly default colour theme and supports split views, tabs, and keyboard shortcuts for touch-based devices.
Station also supports a distraction-free work environment, where you can hide the top bar to make it a more productive terminal.
Shelf – Document Viewer
The Shelf is the default document viewer for Nitrux OS and operating systems that support the Maui kit. It can read and helps you to annotate documents of several types. Most major file types are supported, such as PDF, ODT, etc.
One of the unique features of this application is that you can browse the document pages in horizontal mode, other than the usual vertical mode. A nice feature is helpful for users using touch-based devices.
The annotation feature allows you to annotate with a pen, highlighter and eraser in PDF and other documents and save them.
Pix
The final application in this list is Pix, an essential image viewer that supports all types of image formats. The Pix helps you browse the collection of images and tag them for quick discovery.
You can view the image metadata and basic image edition as well. The image editing features to support the below functionalities –
- Changing brightness, contrast, saturation, exposure
- Supports layers
- Cropping and rotating
However, you can not annotate with arrows or add any text to the image.
Installing these Maui applications
All these applications come pre-loaded in Nitrux Linux distribution. However, if you like to install these in Ubuntu or Fedora-based systems, you can use the AppImage standalone executables from the below link. After downloading, make the file executable and run.
Note: If you are using Android mobile phones, you can also find the official .apk files in the same path mentioned below!
| Maui application | download path for AppImage and .apk |
|---|---|
| Index – File Manager | https://download.kde.org/stable/maui/index/ |
| Nota – Text Editor | https://download.kde.org/stable/maui/nota/ |
| Vvave – Music organizer | https://download.kde.org/stable/maui/vvave/ |
| Clip Video Player | https://download.kde.org/stable/maui/clip/ |
| Station – Terminal | https://download.kde.org/stable/maui/station/ |
| Shelf – Document Viewer | https://download.kde.org/stable/maui/shelf/ |
| Pix | https://download.kde.org/stable/maui/pix/ |
You can open any of the paths. Then go to the latest version folder and download the AppImage or .apk file as per your need. A sample guide is presented below.
Closing Notes
I feel most of the above Nitrux or Maui applications have the same essential features, such as tagging and other items. The reason is all of them are based on Maui technology. But that’s fine because all these apps perfectly support convergence and can work on your desktop, tabs and Plasma-based mobile phones.
Thanks to Maui and KDE technology, I feel the apps look friendly with built-in dark mode supports and features.
So, what is your favourite application on this list? Let me know in the comment box down below.
Cheers.
Some image credits – Maui, Nitrux team.
via: https://www.debugpoint.com/top-nitrux-maui-applications/