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Basic Usage

This guide walks you from "I just booted PAI" to "I can do real work" without assuming any prior Linux experience. For deeper flows see advanced.md; for commands see cli.md; for system tweaks see configuration.md.

1. The desktop tour

PAI boots into Sway, a tiling Wayland compositor. That means windows snap into place automatically instead of floating.

  • The bar (bottom of screen) shows: workspaces, active window title, Tor status, network, battery, clock, and the AI indicator.
  • The launcher opens with Super + d (the Super key is usually the Windows/Command key). Type a program name and hit Enter.
  • Workspaces are virtual desktops numbered 1–9. Switch with Super + 1..Super + 9. Move the focused window to another workspace with Super + Shift + <number>.
  • Moving windows: focus with Super + h/j/k/l (left/down/up/right), move with Super + Shift + h/j/k/l. Close with Super + Shift + q.
  • Split direction: Super + b for horizontal, Super + v for vertical — the next window you open will tile that way.
  • Fullscreen: Super + f. Float a window: Super + Shift + space.

If you get lost, press Super + Shift + c to reload the config and Super + Shift + e to exit the session.

2. Connecting to Wi-Fi

Click the network icon in the bar, or press Super + n to open the network menu.

  1. Select your SSID from the list.
  2. Enter the password.
  3. Wait for the green checkmark.

What MAC spoofing does

By default, PAI randomizes your network card's hardware address (the MAC address) every time it connects. This prevents a café, airport, or hotel from recognizing your laptop across visits. It does not hide your traffic — for that, use Tor.

You can toggle spoofing in the network menu, or at the command line with nmcli connection modify ... 802-11-wireless.cloned-mac-address (see cli.md).

3. Opening a browser privately

PAI ships with a hardened Firefox-based browser as the default.

  • Launch it from the bar or with Super + Enter, firefox.
  • The Tor button in the toolbar routes that tab through the Tor network. You'll see the status flip to a small onion when active.
  • Bookmarks are kept on the persistent volume if you enabled it (see §6). Otherwise they vanish at shutdown — that's the point of a live session.

A few private-browsing habits worth forming:

  • Close the browser fully between unrelated tasks. A fresh session resets cookies and fingerprinting entropy.
  • Don't log into personal accounts over Tor and then non-Tor in the same session — correlation becomes trivial.
  • The default search engine is DuckDuckGo; swap it in Preferences if you prefer another.

4. Talking to your AI

PAI's whole point is that the AI lives on your laptop.

  1. Open a terminal: Super + Enter.
  2. Run: ollama run llama3.2
  3. Wait a few seconds for the model to load into memory.
  4. Type your prompt. Press Enter. Read the answer.

Exit with Ctrl + d or /bye.

Prompting tips

  • Be specific. "Write me a 5-line shell script that lists the 10 largest files in my home directory" beats "help with shell."
  • Give the model a role. "You are an experienced Linux sysadmin. Explain…" steers style and depth.
  • Iterate. If the first answer is off, tell the model what's wrong instead of starting over.
  • Smaller models are faster but less accurate. llama3.2 (3B) is great for quick Q&A; for harder tasks try a larger model — see advanced.md §1.

5. Sending and receiving crypto

PAI includes wallet GUIs for Bitcoin, Monero, and Ethereum. Open them from the launcher (type wallet).

Before you do anything with real funds, read this twice:

  • Live mode vs persistent mode matters. In a live (non-persistent) session, any wallet you create is destroyed at shutdown — including the seed phrase. If you don't write the seed down on paper before shutting down, your coins are gone forever.
  • Persistent mode saves the wallet to the encrypted persistent volume. Losing the passphrase to that volume is equivalent to losing the seed.
  • For meaningful amounts, use cold signing: keep the keys on an offline PAI install or a hardware wallet, and broadcast from a different machine. See advanced.md §7.

Receiving is safe in any mode — generate an address, share it, done. Sending is where the rules above matter.

6. Saving your work

By default, PAI is amnesic: every reboot starts from a clean slate. That's a feature, not a bug.

If you want some things to survive reboot, enable persistence:

  1. From the launcher, run persistence-setup.
  2. Choose a passphrase (long, memorable, written down somewhere safe).
  3. Pick what to persist: wallets, dotfiles, browser bookmarks, downloaded models, SSH keys.

What persistence saves: the directories you explicitly opt into.

What persistence does NOT save: - System logs (wiped on shutdown by design). - Browser history from non-persistent profiles. - Shell history (unless you persist ~/.bash_history). - Anything written to /tmp, /var/tmp, or /run.

Treat persistence as "I deliberately want this to survive" — not as a general-purpose home directory.

7. Shutting down safely

Three ways to end a session, with very different consequences.

  • Reboot (Super + Shift + r or systemctl reboot): restarts the machine normally. Persistent data survives; RAM is cleared by the reboot itself.
  • Poweroff (Super + Shift + p or systemctl poweroff): shuts down cleanly. Same guarantees as reboot, plus the machine is off.
  • Leave-no-trace RAM wipe: PAI overwrites RAM with zeros on shutdown to defeat cold-boot attacks. This is the default — you don't need to enable anything. If you yank the power cord instead, you skip the wipe. Don't do that unless you have to.

For the paranoid: after poweroff, wait ~30 seconds before moving the laptop. DRAM decays slowly enough that quick physical access to the chips can still recover keys for a short window.

Where to go next

  • advanced.md — larger models, headless use, Tor hidden services, cold signing.
  • cli.md — compact command reference.
  • configuration.md — tweak the bar, keybinds, firewall, and more.