ok so i just got into i3 and so on myself
this guy has a cool setup
https://github.com/electro7/dotfilesit's for debian/i3
i made a shell script to install his soykaf faster, there was detailed instructions but i didnt feel like typing them in by hand
so you can just install a debian (without gfx) on virtualbox or something to try it out, log in as root and then run
$ apt-get install curl
$ bash <(curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mope1/dotfiles/master/netinstall/install.sh)
it will install some packages and my fork of electro7's dotfiles
it's still wip so your username is electro7 because he had his homedir name hardcoded somewhere in his configs, but my script prompts you for password somewhere in the middle
there is still some soykaf missing and some things i dont understand [1] so do it on virtualbox or a machine you dont care about
[1] i cant get iceweasel to start somehow (it used to work without lightdm and his configs), and how the fuarrrk do i copy paste from shell to vim and out again, middle mouse doesnt seem to paste in vim. and also i need to set up automatic username login in lightdm so you dont have to type electro7 or whatever you choose for username (once you can do that)