The downsides of Arch ?

paulr · 2007-03-27 08:19:22

I've been pondering this. All I can come up with is :

1) it's a bleeding edge distro so things may occasionally go wrong in the setup or be more unstable. Though it's beautifully stable so far - and I'm running beryl

2) the community is smaller than those for ubuntu and gentoo ..... though very helpful.

vacant · 2007-03-27 08:31:11

I don't even see (1) as a downside. I "pacman -Suy" my personal PC daily so runs a slight risk of running into problems. I have a spare hard drive with a copy of the system I run at Cybercafé so once a month I upgrade that, check it all works, and if so take the pacman cache down to Cybercafé and upgrade there.

If you don't have a hard drive spare there is nothing to stop you having two Arch root partitions and two boot loader entries so you always have a working backup system to hand.

dolby · 2007-03-27 08:44:42

the occasionally u mention id it trade for a rarely at least judging from my experience. im an archer for 8 months now and only problems i had were due to my lack of knowledge & experience. packages occasionally were built with some options enabled/disabled that shouldnt have, but nothing ever literally broke.
as for no.2 i concur , noting that such as a relatively small community like the arch linux's one need all the support it can get from everyone, even plain users.

Last edited by dolby (2007-03-27 08:45:43)

somairotevoli · 2007-03-27 09:16:24

Out of the 20 or so distros I tried before Arch, none lasted more then 2 weeks for me. Things just didn't work. I would always end up breaking things. I been using Arch for almost a year now and only reinstalled once, not because anything was broken.....I just got bored.

.:B:. · 2007-03-27 09:18:38

I find Arch is a bit bulky when it comes to deps, compared to Slack-based systems. I installed Arch on my server, and it has gcc and some other development stuff on it, while I don't need that at all - I don't compile a single package on the server. I can't remove gcc either because that will break deps...

About the size of the community: I don't care much, I prefer a low-profile distro, that's what Arch is . Gentoo is way overrated, and a smaller community doesn't mean you don't have power users on board. Arch is there to prove that.

Intermediate/advanced users don't need much to fall back on, they usually got plenty of skills - or initiative - to cover their problems.

grizz · 2007-03-27 11:34:10

Packages are big, too big. I have to install much unnesesary stuff eg. if i want kword, i have to install whole koffice
And this same with KDE, but luckly kdemod exists...

Ideal packages are in PLD...

fk · 2007-03-27 11:43:38

grizz wrote:

Packages are big, too big. I have to install much unnesesary stuff eg. if i want kword, i have to install whole koffice
And this same with KDE, but luckly kdemod exists...
Ideal packages are in PLD...

This has nothing to do with arch, its the fault of KDE, not archs fault

grizz · 2007-03-27 12:35:20

It was only example...

fk · 2007-03-27 13:05:40

grizz wrote:

It was only example...

OK , and what exactly is too big? You can criticise Arch, no Problem, but not "It's bad...." say it exactly.

baze · 2007-03-27 13:08:31

as much as i like the simple bsd scripts, i'd prefer if arch would switch to upstart in the future. i really like the much more flexible system that upstart provides and imho upstart is the only modern approach which reflects what can happen to modern systems. frugalware is switching to upstart aswell, so it's not only ubuntu

i don't know if the arch devs consider switching in the future, but i'd very much appreciate it.

grizz · 2007-03-27 13:37:10

fk wrote:

grizz wrote:
It was only example...
OK , and what exactly is too big? You can criticise Arch, no Problem, but not "It's bad...." say it exactly.

Ok. Simply, when I compare packages in Arch with packages from PLD, i see that Arch ones are not so fragmented as in PLD...

so I have to install sth what i don't need to.

You said, that it's not Arch fault, but kde... I can't agree with that...

But it's MY opinion, and you needn't agree with me

fk · 2007-03-27 13:54:43

But it's MY opinion, and you needn't agree with me

Yes, you are right.

Maybe, gentoo is a better choice to you than Arch, you can split up all deps you don't need

stonecrest · 2007-03-27 15:25:36

grizz wrote:

You said, that it's not Arch fault, but kde... I can't agree with that...

You're entitled to that opinion of course, but it's wrong.

My criticisms of Arch are its ridiculous stance on stripping docs (not that I would use them often, but to save me 50mb? come on) and the fact that it installs openoffice, firefox, acroread, and similar programs to /opt. I personally think only GNOME, KDE, and Xfce should be installed to /opt, and I'd even be okay with nothing being installed there.

It would also be great to see an unsupported repo at some point, for those who don't mind the "risk", but I can't really call that a downside since the fact that unsupported even exists is awesome.

baze · 2007-03-27 15:35:54

stonecrest wrote:

My criticisms of Arch are its ridiculous stance on stripping docs (not that I would use them often, but to save me 50mb? come on) and the fact that it installs openoffice, firefox, acroread, and similar programs to /opt. I personally think only GNOME, KDE, and Xfce should be installed to /opt, and I'd even be okay with nothing being installed there.

i totally agree on that one!

Last edited by baze (2007-03-27 15:36:20)

Lontronics · 2007-03-27 15:42:54

I am using Arch for a week now, after 1,5 years of Slackware derivates.

And although I do like Arch very much I think:

- There are too much dependencies on packages

- The base system is too large. I think for a base system some stuff could be removed.
It would probably be an idea to remove all development stuff and sources for a base system...

- About removing the docs;
I would also like to see the man pages removed, because these days everyone does have internet and can find information there.
I do not need man pages and other doc stuff.

Last edited by Lontronics (2007-03-27 15:44:01)

fk · 2007-03-27 15:46:47

Lontronics wrote:

I am using Arch for a week now, after 1,5 years of Slackware derivates.
And although I do like Arch very much I think:
- There are too much dependencies on packages
- The base system is too large. I think for a base system some stuff could be removed.
It would probably be an idea to remove all development stuff and sources for a base system...
- About removing the docs;
I would also like to see the man pages removed, because these days everyone does have internet and can find information there.
I do not need man pages and other doc stuff.

About remov the man pages, totally disagree, I don't want to go in the WWW every time I look for an comand switch...

About the base system: Have you recogniced that the base system is only ~100MB big?

Echo · 2007-03-27 17:03:09

I don't want to go in the WWW every time I look for an comand switch...

Yep, the above quote is exactly the situation when I reference manpages. Man is quicker in this instance...

phrakture · 2007-03-27 17:21:32

re: too many deps. This really has to do with the authors of the program.

re: man pages. man pages are extremely useful, just today I recall referencing 'man find' and 'man exports' - try googling for those... "find" and "exports" are going to require much more extra info to find on google. For instance, I had to google "linux nfs exports" just to find relevant information, and even that was lacking compared to the man page.

.:B:. · 2007-03-27 18:25:56

phrakture wrote:

re: too many deps. This really has to do with the authors of the program.

That depends. I always wonder what an extra dependency contributes to the capabilities of a program (since a lot of deps are optional). I built LFS myself numerous times, and there are quite some packages Arch has depending on for example GCC - while I wonder why. Same goes when you compare Arch with Slack..

Anyway - don't take i the wrong way . I like Arch very much, it's maintenance friendlier than a lot of Slack-based systems (and till now there is no Slack spin-off that is up to par). It's just that some of those deps are so deeply rooted on the system it would be way too much work to rebuild it all myself .

Susu · 2007-03-27 18:38:03

I agree with stonecrest. I don't think it's nessecary to strip the docs. And removine even manpages would make looking up things more complicated. I often have a look at manpages and I don't want to search the net for a little switch. That would be ridiculous...

Another issue: I don't like ABS very much. As long as you just want to add or remove a feature from an existing PKGBUILD, it's easy, I agree. But creating own PKGBUILDS is still too much work for me. And building an own kernel is still a pain with ABS. But that's just my 2 cent... ;-)

Winblowz99 · 2007-03-27 18:42:04

I have always been a big fan of Gentoo, but I have lately become so fond of Arch that I will probably switch both my server and desktop permanently over to it. I still love Gentoo, but it can sometimes become too much of a burden or more trouble than it is worth. But I am in no way going to take away from it, as it is still an awesome distro (despite the problems they are currently having).

Arch gives me the power and amount of control I need, without going to far or overdoing it (like Gentoo), but not restricting me (like Ubuntu).

Despite the fact that Gentoo has a larger community, I like this one much better. It might be smaller, but everyone here knows what they're doing, they're VERY helpful, respectful and polite, and they give great advice. Not that the Gentoo community is the opposite, but I have yet to find one person in the Arch community that has been treated like crap or treated another like crap. Everyone just seems to get along here

As for the downsides, my number one complaint would be the fact that AUR isn't very well integrated (yet) into pacman. I heard that this is being worked on, so maybe in the future this will no longer be a problem. I don't like the fact that I have to visit the Arch AUR website, download the gzipped tarball, unpack it, cd to the directory, install the dependencies, make the package, and finally install the binary. IMHO it should be much easier than this. I should just be able to uncomment the Unsupported repo in the /etc/pacman.conf file and be able to get what I need.

My only other complaint would be that KDE doesn't have split packages like in Gentoo. I fully understand the reason for this, because Arch doesn't have enough devs. I haven't tried KDEMod yet, so I can't comment about it, but I'm looking forward to trying it very soon. Still, split packages kick the shit out of monolithic packages.

I don't need man pages, as anytime I need help/info I use the internet. I've NEVER used man pages (on any distro).

But these are very minor complaints. Arch is awesome

Last edited by Winblowz99 (2007-03-27 18:44:20)

Snarkout · 2007-03-27 18:43:29

I'd have to agree that docs are useful and I never quite understood the strippage.

I'd have to disagree that the man pages should be stripped. In fact, I'd have to find another distro if the man pages disappeared. I use man several times a day, generally.

My own personal "gripe" if you can call it that is that about once a month I discover something no longer works on my system and I have to dick around with it to fix it, or wait around until its fixed. The recent python upgrade comes to mind - gourmet no longer launches, and I haven't had the dick with it time, and I haven't waited around long enough to see anything since as far as I know I broke it with an Syu on saturday. All I can say with certainty is that I couldn't open gourmet to get at my recipes. Gourmet dies on frugalware, too, though so it isn't really an "Arch issue." It *is* the single largest drawback of rolling release, though, IMO.

lumiwa · 2007-03-27 19:32:31

Lontronics wrote:

I am using Arch for a week now, after 1,5 years of Slackware derivates.
And although I do like Arch very much I think:

- About removing the docs;
I would also like to see the man pages removed, because these days everyone does have internet and can find information there.
I do not need man pages and other doc stuff.

Removing the doccs and what you suggesting man pages is whatI hate in Arch. I don't want to go for everything on the Internet when I am working withh something. It is stupid.
BTW I downloaded many docs and help files by myself and installed them. And Arch is still fast as before.

Lontronics · 2007-03-27 19:44:25

It's not speed, it is unused space

But I can live with it, and as said before by B, don't take it the wrong way

RevertTS · 2007-03-27 20:54:03

Snarkout wrote:

I use man several times a day, generally.

Same here.

I used to agree with the idea of stripping the extra documentation, but after running into a few times where I really needed it and realizing it wouldn't take up much extra space at all, I changed my mind.

Aside from that, my main problem with Arch at this point is the thing about pulling in lots of dependencies. It's not really a problem specific to Arch, but an issue I have with binary based distros in general. I was considering trying Gentoo when I get my laptop because I'd like some of the extra control it has, but given the current state it seems to be in, I doubt I will. SourceMage is interesting, though.

I've honestly never had a problem with Arch being "bleeding edge." I don't run testing and I'd be hard pressed to think of times when stuff broke. I remember VLC being compiled without an option or some such, and possibly 1-2 other occurrences along that line, but every time stuff really messed up it was my fault.

So all in all, I'm happy and have no particularly relevant gripes.

Arch Linux

#1 2007-03-27 08:19:22

The downsides of Arch ?

#2 2007-03-27 08:31:11

Re: The downsides of Arch ?

#3 2007-03-27 08:44:42

Re: The downsides of Arch ?

#4 2007-03-27 09:16:24

Re: The downsides of Arch ?

#5 2007-03-27 09:18:38

Re: The downsides of Arch ?

#6 2007-03-27 11:34:10

Re: The downsides of Arch ?

#7 2007-03-27 11:43:38

Re: The downsides of Arch ?

#8 2007-03-27 12:35:20

Re: The downsides of Arch ?

#9 2007-03-27 13:05:40

Re: The downsides of Arch ?

#10 2007-03-27 13:08:31

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#11 2007-03-27 13:37:10

Re: The downsides of Arch ?

#12 2007-03-27 13:54:43

Re: The downsides of Arch ?

#13 2007-03-27 15:25:36

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#14 2007-03-27 15:35:54

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#15 2007-03-27 15:42:54

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#16 2007-03-27 15:46:47

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#17 2007-03-27 17:03:09

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#18 2007-03-27 17:21:32

Re: The downsides of Arch ?

#19 2007-03-27 18:25:56

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#20 2007-03-27 18:38:03

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#21 2007-03-27 18:42:04

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#22 2007-03-27 18:43:29

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#23 2007-03-27 19:32:31

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#24 2007-03-27 19:44:25

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#25 2007-03-27 20:54:03

Re: The downsides of Arch ?

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