my website
feat: add mise
+262
+262
src/content/blog/mise.md
+262
src/content/blog/mise.md
···
1
+
---
2
+
title: A love letter to mise
3
+
description: "using mise to install packages on an immutable distro"
4
+
publish_date: 2026-04-30
5
+
tags: [projects, explained]
6
+
---
7
+
8
+
Recently, I have been using [GNOME OS][gnome-os], as my daily driver.
9
+
10
+
After being a seasoned Linux for long, dabbling in distros like [Alpine Linux][alpine], [Arch Linux][arch], Fedora (and even Silverblue), I tried switching to something more _opinionated_ and that "works by default" all while being hard to break.
11
+
12
+
And given my existing [relationship with GNOME][gnome-rel], GNOME OS was a choice worth looking into.
13
+
14
+
One feature of GNOME OS is that it is immutable (i.e. system files are read-only). It also doesn't ship with a package manager, so it doesn't have functionality built-in to install extra packages.
15
+
16
+
You can install GUI Applications normally using [Flathub][flathub] (and Snap/AppImage), but installing non-GUI applications like development tools or CLI packages is not built-in.
17
+
18
+
There are of course several solutions you can use, such as [homebrew], [coldbrew], but today we will focus on [mise].
19
+
20
+
21
+
## What is mise?
22
+
23
+
[mise] pitches itself as "One tool to manage languages, env vars, and tasks per project, reproducibly."
24
+
25
+
However, I only use a fraction of it's functionality, in that I only use it to install packages.
26
+
27
+
## How to install it?
28
+
29
+
The instructions are here: https://mise.jdx.dev/getting-started.html
30
+
31
+
But essentially it's as easy as running this (remember to read the source of the installer first):
32
+
33
+
```bash
34
+
curl https://mise.run | sh
35
+
```
36
+
37
+
## Activating mise
38
+
39
+
Then you will need to "activate" mise, which essentially makes tools installed by mise available by modifying your `$PATH` variable
40
+
41
+
```bash
42
+
echo 'eval "$(~/.local/bin/mise activate bash --shims)"' >> ~/.bashrc
43
+
```
44
+
45
+
The instructions above are for bash, so you will need to consult the docs to get instructions for your shell.
46
+
47
+
You will need to re-login for the `mise` command to be available, or open a new shell.
48
+
49
+
### A note on shims
50
+
51
+
> Feel free to skip this section, as it's just an explainer
52
+
53
+
Also, note that the above command use the `--shims` flag, which is NOT the default. It essentially means that mise will modify the `$PATH` variable, instead of doing a weird thing where it will re-activate itself after each command you run.
54
+
55
+
The non-shim way to activate mise is useful when you use mise to install different package versions across different repositories, but that sometimes breaks IDEs and is our of the scope of this blog post.
56
+
57
+
## Installing packages
58
+
59
+
You can start installing your first package with `mise`:
60
+
61
+
```sh
62
+
mise use -g java
63
+
```
64
+
65
+
The above command installs `java` globally (hence the `-g` flag), which you can now confirm by running:
66
+
67
+
```
68
+
$ java --version
69
+
openjdk 26.0.1 2026-04-21
70
+
OpenJDK Runtime Environment (build 26.0.1+8-34)
71
+
OpenJDK 64-Bit Server VM (build 26.0.1+8-34, mixed mode, sharing)
72
+
```
73
+
74
+
You can install much more tools, of which you can find a non-complete list here: [mise-tools].
75
+
76
+
For example, you can similarly install a specific major version of nodejs
77
+
78
+
```sh
79
+
mise use -g node@22
80
+
```
81
+
82
+
Or install the latest LTS version of node
83
+
84
+
```sh
85
+
mise use -g node@lts
86
+
```
87
+
88
+
Or you can be overlay specific
89
+
90
+
```sh
91
+
mise use -g node@v25.9.0
92
+
mise use -g node@25.9.0 # this works too!
93
+
```
94
+
95
+
## Searching
96
+
97
+
Use `mise search` to find packages.
98
+
99
+
```
100
+
mise search typ
101
+
Tool Description
102
+
typos Source code spell checker. https://github.com/crate-ci/typos
103
+
typst A new markup-based typesetting system that is powerful and easy to learn. https://github.com/typst/typst
104
+
typstyle Beautiful and reliable typst code formatter. https://github.com/Enter-tainer/typstyle
105
+
quicktype Generate types and converters from JSON, Schema, and GraphQL provided by https://quicktype.io. https://www.npmjs.com/package/quicktype
106
+
```
107
+
108
+
## Uninstalling
109
+
110
+
```
111
+
mise unuse -g node
112
+
```
113
+
114
+
## Updating
115
+
116
+
```
117
+
mise self-update # updating mise itself
118
+
mise up # updating tools installed by mise
119
+
mise outdated # checking if you have outdated tools
120
+
```
121
+
122
+
## Config File
123
+
124
+
Tools you install with mise globally will be saved in the file `~/.config/mise/config.toml`, which you can commit to your dotfiles so you can have similar tools across different machines.
125
+
126
+
Here's an example of my mise config file at the time of writing this blog post.
127
+
128
+
```toml
129
+
# ~/.config/mise/config.toml
130
+
[tools]
131
+
bat = "latest"
132
+
btop = "latest"
133
+
bun = "latest"
134
+
caddy = "latest"
135
+
"cargo:mergiraf" = "latest"
136
+
deno = "latest"
137
+
difftastic = "latest"
138
+
doggo = "latest"
139
+
fastfetch = "latest"
140
+
fzf = "latest"
141
+
github-cli = "latest"
142
+
"github:railwayapp/railpack" = "latest"
143
+
glab = "latest"
144
+
helix = "latest"
145
+
java = "latest"
146
+
lazygit = "latest"
147
+
node = "latest"
148
+
"npm:vscode-langservers-extracted" = "latest"
149
+
oha = "latest"
150
+
pipx = "latest"
151
+
pnpm = "latest"
152
+
prettier = "latest"
153
+
rust = "latest"
154
+
scooter = "latest"
155
+
tmux = "latest"
156
+
usage = "latest"
157
+
yt-dlp = { version = "latest", rename_exe = "yt-dlp" }
158
+
zellij = "latest"
159
+
"github:patryk-ku/music-discord-rpc" = { version = "latest", asset_pattern = "music-discord-rpc" }
160
+
rclone = "latest"
161
+
mc = "latest"
162
+
go = "latest"
163
+
"go:git.sr.ht/~migadu/alps/cmd/alps" = "latest"
164
+
"npm:localtunnel" = "latest"
165
+
```
166
+
167
+
After the tools inside the config has changed, you can run the following comand to make mise re-install packages from the config file
168
+
169
+
```
170
+
mise install
171
+
```
172
+
173
+
## Mise Backends
174
+
175
+
Mise is able to install packages from multiple sources. These sources are called "backends" by mise.
176
+
177
+
When you type `mise use -g node@22`, it will resolve `node` against the registry and figure out that the default backend for `node` is `core`
178
+
179
+
### Core
180
+
181
+
The default backend is called `core` and tools from this backend are usually provided from the official source.
182
+
183
+
Other tools that are available from `core` include Node.js, Ruby, Python, etc...
184
+
185
+
We could also have been explicit with the backend we want to use
186
+
187
+
```
188
+
mise use -g core:node
189
+
```
190
+
191
+
You can find [a list of all core packages here][mise-core].
192
+
193
+
### Aqua
194
+
195
+
You can also install packages from the [Aqua] registry.
196
+
197
+
### Language Package Managers
198
+
199
+
You can also install tools from their respective package managers. Here are a few examples
200
+
201
+
#### `npm`
202
+
203
+
You can install prettier, typescript, oxlint and other JavaScript/TypeScript tools published on the npm registry. Find the tools on [npm]
204
+
205
+
```bash
206
+
mise use -g npm:prettier
207
+
```
208
+
209
+
#### `pipx`
210
+
211
+
You can install black, poetry and other Python tools from pypi. Find the tools on [pypi]
212
+
213
+
```bash
214
+
mise use -g pipx:black
215
+
pipx:git+https://github.com/psf/black.git # from a github repo
216
+
```
217
+
218
+
#### `cargo`
219
+
220
+
You can install cargo packages with this backed. You need to have rust installed beforehand though, which you can do with mise
221
+
222
+
```bash
223
+
mise use -g rust
224
+
```
225
+
226
+
Then install your packages
227
+
228
+
```bash
229
+
mise use -g cargo:eza
230
+
```
231
+
232
+
There are more [language package manager backends][mise-backends] like: `gem`, `go` and more.
233
+
234
+
### Github
235
+
236
+
You can install packages from Github directly, as long as the project you are trying to install from uses Github releases
237
+
238
+
```bash
239
+
mise use -g github:railwayapp/railpack
240
+
```
241
+
242
+
mise will usually auto-detect which asset you want to use, but you can also specify the asset glob in `~/.config/mise/config.toml`
243
+
244
+
```toml
245
+
[tools]
246
+
"github:patryk-ku/music-discord-rpc" = { version = "latest", asset_pattern = "music-discord-rpc" }
247
+
```
248
+
249
+
[alpine]: https://alpinelinux.org
250
+
[gnome-rel]: https://teams.pages.gitlab.gnome.org/Websites/people.gnome.org/#jimmac:~:text=Angelo%20Verlain%20Shema
251
+
[arch]: https://archlinux.org
252
+
[fedora]: https://fedoraproject.org/
253
+
[flathub]: https://flathub.org/en
254
+
[homebrew]: https://brew.sh/
255
+
[coldbrew]: https://gitlab.postmarketos.org/postmarketOS/coldbrew
256
+
[mise]: https://mise.jdx.dev/
257
+
[mise-tools]: https://mise-tools.jdx.dev/
258
+
[npm]: https://www.npmjs.com/search?q=keywords:cli
259
+
[pypi]: https://pypi.org/
260
+
[mise-core]: https://mise.jdx.dev/core-tools.html
261
+
[mise-backends]: https://mise.jdx.dev/dev-tools/backends/
262
+
[aqua]: https://aquaproj.github.io/