Nova Launcher was a very popular launcher many years ago. Its not Foss. If you read the post you’d known that the developer was working to make it open source but now stopped.

Well, you can add some apps and widgets on home screen. 1.For Apps: Settings > Home screen > Dock. After that add the apps you want on home screen to Favorites. 2. For Widgets: Settings > Home screen > Enable Show Widgets on Home screen. After doing that Swipe up that will show widgets. Go to end to edit widgets and add whatever widget you like.

Other than that yeah it is different , it is supposed to be different. Like, how Niagara launcher is different. If you want something more like nova launcher then I’d suggest Lawnchair.

Try Kvaesitso its free and open source: https://github.com/MM2-0/Kvaesitso