why you choose ArchLinux?

Trilby · 2020-07-26 16:30:24

rinakra wrote:

I am a Linux beginner and despite what everyone was saying, I find other distros very very confusing.

The idea that arch is (only) for "experienced" linux users have never sat well with me. I don't think experience is particularly relevant. To any degree it is relevant, the quality of the experience is far more influential than the quantity. But I just don't think experience matters much at all compared to mindset. The desire to understand and capacity to think logically about what the system is doing is all that is necessary to be an effective arch user.

Perhaps the "experience" concept for the target audience is just a tactful way of approaching people who do not have the right mindset. People who actively avoid understanding or have demonstrated a lack of capacity to think logically and critically can be encouraged to spend some time learning with "easier" distros first rather than confronting them on the actual problem.

rinakra wrote:

Although there is a certain "elitest vibe" and the forums aren't the friendliest place in the world, I honestly think it is mostly for show.

Is this based on threads you've actually read, or is this just what you've heard "rumored" online? Arch certainly does have a reputation along these lines among some people on the 'interwebs'. But most people who actually come to the forums and assess them (us) by first hand experience conclude that such accusations are unfounded.

We are certainly unapologetic about our community ethos which is outlined in our community guidelines in the wiki, but more thoroughly elaborated by Xyne's analogy.

We (perhaps I in particular) have been known to be quite abrupt in showing someone the door when it is clear they are here for the wrong reasons (e.g., parasitic attitudes that would damage the community). But this is not elitist. This is sane community management.

Last edited by Trilby (2020-07-26 16:35:43)

GaKu999 · 2020-07-26 17:44:59

As said by @Trilby, experience is not a requirement, but rather the mindset, the desire for knowledge, willing to learn the unknown without giving up after the first mistake, a little bit of it's principles, and of course, the wiki.

Heck I remember when I was just a n00b, only experienced in cmd, ps, and all the other GUI garbage...
The amount of power and control you get in *nix can be overwhelming at first, but it's a LOT better once you get the hang of it.

Can't say that curiosity killed the cat, but poking around on '/dev, /proc, /run, and /sys' was indeed some "experience" at best...
It was scary when I ran 'cat /dev/random' and the terminal got garbled, or 'cat /dev/port' and everything froze requiring a hard reset...

Linux makes you give value to double-check everything you are about to type to it's shells, especially if you are about to use tools in the 'danger-zone' as root (dd for example).
After all, there's nobody holding your hand anymore!

And of course, the power ArchLinux gives over your system, while remaining simple and minimalist, some humorously describe it as "Linux, with a nice package manager.".

Idk how many Archers give value to the mailing lists, but I really like the transparency in ArchLinux!
Having a system that doesn't give you an unpleasant surprise without warning is infinitely better!

(Don't think that was all, I had to fill this a couple of times, '/dev/null' is so helpful when it happens! )

rinakra · 2020-07-27 17:57:40

Trilby wrote:

Perhaps the "experience" concept for the target audience is just a tactful way of approaching people who do not have the right mindset. People who actively avoid understanding or have demonstrated a lack of capacity to think logically and critically can be encouraged to spend some time learning with "easier" distros first rather than confronting them on the actual problem.

First of all, when I said there is an "elitest vibe" and that the forums aren't the friendliest place in the world, this is a pure impression and I don't really mean it to be any kind of insult or criticism. There certainly are posts on this forum that I've seen that could be described as "abrupt" to put it lightly but you are right that my impression is also colored by what people say on the internet and irl.

I completely understand the philosophy you are referencing and I personally enjoy it but I think it's very interesting how this all works. In my job, I teach math to college students. A phenomenon I see a lot is there are talented students with low confidence. By and large these students are women. They are curious, willing to learn, and more than capable but don't attempt to take "difficult" classes such as the honor's level calculus sequence at our university.

On the other hand, there are also students who are perhaps less talented, but very confident. They go ahead and try difficult classes and some do well, others not so much, but they probably learned more than the students who didn't try in the first place despite what their level of talent was in the beginning.

From my point of view a *huge* reason why there are so few women in the honor's calculus classes is because there is an intentionally constructed "vibe" around these classes meant to discourage students who don't want a challenge. This somehow ends up also discouraging students who definitely have the capacity to think logically and critically but just don't really "believe in themselves."

I think Arch Linux is exactly like this. I spent years and years using Windows because I thought Linux was "for computer people." I got involved for ethical reasons and once I tried it out I was literally shocked at how easy it all was. Of course not everything is easy and I've definitely sunk a couple days into my computer after breaking it a couple times. But by and large it's probably easier to install arch linux than to figure out how to do my taxes properly. Somehow my lack of confidence never stopped me from trying things like difficult math classes but I think I'm the exception. As a mathematician, teaching is a huge part of the job. I am really interested in how we can facilitate an environment that makes it clear that you must think for yourself, you must read the book (or the Arch wiki) and actually get your hands dirty before asking for help, but at the same time portraying an honest and accurate image of how difficult the task really is. There must be a way to say "you have to think" without also saying "this is only for geniuses". I don't think the fault really lies with the current Arch Linux community by any means. It's probably all part of some kind of momentum that built up the reputation over the years and maybe it's not so easy to change. No matter how welcoming the community is, people are still going to get scared off for the wrong reasons, both in math, and in linux and probably a lot of other things too.

ondoho · 2020-07-28 09:53:50

rinakra wrote:

I said there is an "elitest vibe" and that the forums aren't the friendliest place in the world
...
There must be a way to say "you have to think" without also saying "this is only for geniuses".
...
It's probably all part of some kind of momentum that built up the reputation over the years and maybe it's not so easy to change. No matter how welcoming the community is, people are still going to get scared off for the wrong reasons

IMHO, the Arch forum does its job very well - to provide a communication channel for solving ArchLinux problems.
If you look at the topics that are being closed & binned, they are not being closed because of elitism or other "wrong" reasons, they are being closed for any number of right reasons: necrobumping, pointless bickering & "Not Arch" being the most common. In one word: not following the rules. That's not a personal attack at OP, that's an efficient way of keeping the forums ... erm, efficient.
Hence, there's very little flaming, trolling and bickering happening here.
The curtness might seem cold, but after all it's about getting OS problems solved, not your personal emotions...?

That said, I can see how some forum members are spreading an elitist vibe, and I can also see how some of the aformentioned trolls & idiots spread a certain "reputation" about ArchLinux around the www. Es geht mir am Arsch vorbei, I couldn't care less.

Trilby · 2020-07-28 11:57:29

ondoho wrote:

Hence, there's very little flaming, trolling and bickering happening here.

To be fair a couple of us will not hesitate once a thread has turned into a complete dumpster fire and no moderators are online to close it. Then I fuel the fire and grab the marshmallows. But most of the time even this is intended to ensure no other well-meaning forum member wanders into a help vampires trap.

ondoho · 2020-07-28 12:43:26

^ Oh yes.
But compare this to other forums where such topics are never closed & binned, every resident gets their swing at the piñata, the whole thing derails completely, the flaming flames into other topics... and newbies come in, see that this is the tradition, and try to adapt, and you won't ever be able to put out that fire.
It's better if forum rules are justly put into action (and not anecdotally), without fanfare. Strangely many people seem to think that the mods here are evil & heartless because of that.
I like my share of flaming & trolling, but it's refreshing to come here, where people get told off for posting bullshit, not for using the word bullshit.

schard · 2020-07-28 12:46:16

Why did I choose Arch Linux?
Well, to watch an entire page of a thread going off-topic in the forums by users disucssing how great the elitist way of the Arch community is on keeping threads on-topic.

Trilby · 2020-07-28 13:01:14

ondoho wrote:

... it's refreshing to come here, where people get told off for posting bullshit, not for using the word bullshit.

That's awesome! Can we put that as a subtitle or tagline for the forums?

ondoho · 2020-07-28 18:37:58

^ Sure, knock yourselves out!

pk.gmp · 2020-07-31 09:09:48

For me,

1. Rolling release
2. AUR with plenty of tools which I like
3. KISS principle + minimalist installations. I can choose exactly what I need to install and nothing more.
4. All of my prod systems are linux (I guess this is true with everyone). I get exposed to weird system issues first on my laptop rather than figuring them out in production. Example: As much as there is a whole community which doesn't use systemd, I have been exposed to systemd nuances since last 10+ years due to Arch. I am very comfortable typing/asking my admins to type those commands when we are diagnosing issues even though our prod does use different distro.
5. If I am correct both GKH and LT use arch. I could be wrong.
6. Due to some kernel issues that I got exposed to for my hardware, I ended up learning about compiling custom kernel from sources on kernel.org. Nothing beats that learning.
7. I find community quite supportive. There is a particular way people ask problems to be reported. Once it is out of the way, solutions flow and learning grows.
8. I don't need to fresh install every 18 months (was required when on other distros).
9. Wiki.

It was a deliberate choice for me to use Arch somewhere earlier last decade. No regrets since.

ondoho · 2020-07-31 09:46:22

pk.gmp wrote:

Rolling release
...
minimalist installations. I can choose exactly what I need to install and nothing more.

These were my reasons too. The latter I could've had with a Debian netinstall, but the package management is not to my taste. Dist-upgrade? Backports? Pah!

If I am correct both GKH and LT use arch. I could be wrong.

If you mean Kroah-Hartman and Torvalds:
I'm surprised & pleased to hear the former uses Arch, but the latter is famous for saying he can't be bothered faffing around with manual distro installs. No current info, but last year it was Fedora I guess, amongst others.

Wiki.

It probably wasn't the reason I chose Arch, but the reason I succeeded installing it

Trilby · 2020-07-31 12:01:06

I think it's funny how people care what Linus uses or think it should be relevant. Listen to how Linus talks about his own computer use and competance: I'm pretty sure he'd never use arch linux, and if he tried, he'd probably hate it. His approach to computer use is completely antithetical to "the arch way".

He readily admits he's bad at maintaining systems, and he's ok with that. He doesn't seem to have interest in being better at it.

The guy is great at the kernel and deserve enormous credit for that. But that does not mean he's any good with any other aspect of the linux ecosystem - particularly when he'll state unequivocally that he isn't. He doesn't seem to want to understand much of the inner workings of userspace software; he wants it to "just work".

If he came here anonymously and described his strengths, weaknesses, goals, and desires for a distro, I'm pretty sure everyone here would discourage him from using arch as it does not meet his criteria in any way.

Last edited by Trilby (2020-07-31 12:02:01)

eschwartz · 2020-07-31 15:57:39

https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments … loper_ama/
Including screenshot of using Arch.
Direct link to insightful comment on why: https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments … =8&depth=9

https://www.reddit.com/r/archlinux/comm … ahhartman/

Not that we need vindication from either of them, but it *is* nice to be appreciated:

interview of GregKH wrote:

In the interview Kroah-Hartman talks about downsides of living in the Hague. "My son's school actually mandates that they all have MacBooks. So he has a MacBook, my wife has a MacBook, and that's about it." But of course, Kroah-Hartman himself is always using Linux.
So what distro does he use? "I don't use openSUSE any more, I use Arch. And my build system I think is actually running Fedora. I have a number of virtual machines still running Gentoo, Dubya, and Fedora to do some testing on some userspace tools. But yeah, all my laptops and everything is switched over to Arch these days... I have a Chromebook that I play around with, and you can run Linux applications, and you can of course SSH into anything..."
Why Arch? "At the moment it had something that I needed. I don't remember what it was, the latest development version, what not -- and I've known a number of the Arch developers over the years. Their idea of a constantly rolling, forward-moving system is the way to go... It's neutral, it's community-based, it has everything I need. It works really really well. I've actually converted my cloud instances that I have all to Arch... It's nice." And in addition, "Their Wiki is amazing. The documentation -- it's like one of the best resources out there these days... If you look up any userspace program and how to configure it and use it. Actually, the systemd Arch Wiki pages are one of the most amazing resources out there...
"One of the main policies of Arch, or philosophies, is you stay as close to the upstream as possible. And as a developer, I want that... They're really good in feedback to the community. Because I want that testing -- I want to make sure that things are fixed. And if it is broken, I learn about it quickly and I fix it and push the stuff out. So that's actually a really good feedback loop. And that's some of the reasons I need it."

ondoho · 2020-08-01 11:28:37

^ I like Arch being charcterised as "neutral"!

Trilby wrote:

The guy is great at the kernel and deserve enormous credit for that. But that does not mean he's any good with any other aspect of the linux ecosystem - particularly when he'll state unequivocally that he isn't. He doesn't seem to want to understand much of the inner workings of userspace software; he wants it to "just work".

It is this single-mindedness that made the Linux kernel what it is to day - for better or worse

Buddlespit · 2020-08-02 00:18:04

Trilby wrote:

If he came here anonymously and described his strengths, weaknesses, goals, and desires for a distro, I'm pretty sure everyone here would discourage him from using arch as it does not meet his criteria in any way.

LOL, can you just imagine the PR catastrophe that would happen because he was banned from the forums for throwing a hissy fit when he asked for help the wrong way?

Trilby · 2020-08-02 00:33:33

It'd make a pretty good arch wallpaper:
https://get.wallhere.com/photo/Linus-To … 380653.jpg

GaKu999 · 2020-08-02 01:24:45

Trilby wrote:

It'd make a pretty good arch wallpaper:
https://get.wallhere.com/photo/Linus-To … 380653.jpg

And here I was writing a clinical response with to much details about yada forum rules yada...

What’s the worse that can happen?
The whole distro becoming ArchBSD?

Seems like a pretty good april fools joke...
Too bad they dropped support for april fools...

Interesting, it seems to have been an actual thing, that died in 2017, what a pity...

ondoho · 2020-08-02 09:29:53

Buddlespit wrote:

LOL, can you just imagine the PR catastrophe that would happen because he was banned from the forums for throwing a hissy fit when he asked for help the wrong way?

Are you refering to something like this?

Trilby · 2020-08-02 12:25:31

Ugh ... Everything about that article pisses me off. All of it claims to be not critiquing ESR's points, but rather how he makes them. And I'm not familiar with the incidents in question, perhaps he really was a dick, but all of the "evidence" presented is just out of context quotes of strong words. Meanwhile the author kept repeating how "polite" everyone else remained. Fuck "polite" people* - or as it was much better said by ondoho just a few posts back, that mailing list was clearly not somewhere "people get told off for posting bullshit, not for using the word bullshit", but rather just the opposite.

* People should be treated with respect, of course. But somehow in modern online discourse, "polite" has been redefined as the ability to couch nasty often hateful, violent, and bigotted statements in prim and proper language and have it be acceptable. People deserve respect, ideas deserve critique, and words - all words - are meant to be used to communicate ideas.

Last edited by Trilby (2020-08-02 12:36:48)

Buddlespit · 2020-08-02 21:27:53

@ondoho.. No, I was thinking the Nvidia "finger" incident, like the wallpaper Trilby showed. But that was a cool article.

ondoho · 2020-08-03 08:05:45

^ Yes I seem to remember back then many people weren't happy about this at all, while others thought they found their rebel hero.

Trilby wrote:

And I'm not familiar with the incidents in question, perhaps he really was a dick, but all of the "evidence" presented is just out of context quotes of strong words.

All the evidence is in context, each quote is backed by a link to the list message in question.

If you don't remember the incident it's probably pointless for you, but back when it happened people were throwing it together with the previous "Stallman incident" and deducing that corporations have it in for the "Elders of FOSS", using PC shills to push them out. The article was written to prove the nonsense of that.

Trilby · 2020-08-03 11:59:17

ondoho wrote:

The article was written to prove ...

My claim was (and still is) that the article itself did not prove anything or even provide sound evidence. It established the position of the author and as such functions as a shibboleth to declare which side of an issue the author is on. But position statements that say "the evidence is available, do your own resurch" are not arguments and cannot prove anything. The only evidence against ESR presented in that article is that he used colorful language.

Awebb · 2020-08-03 14:18:14

Trilby wrote:

Fuck "polite" people*

That is mechanically problematic, I have a series of kinks that do not play well with "polite".

Trilby · 2020-08-03 14:44:02

People do tend to say "please" when they ask someone to pass the maple syrup.

eschwartz · 2020-08-03 15:10:19

Since esr is such a fan of colorful language, I wonder if we can get a volunteer to colorfully respond to this stance on security: https://gitlab.com/esr/gif2png/-/issues … _183641302

Arch Linux

#701 2020-07-26 16:30:24

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#702 2020-07-26 17:44:59

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#703 2020-07-27 17:57:40

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#704 2020-07-28 09:53:50

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#705 2020-07-28 11:57:29

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#706 2020-07-28 12:43:26

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#707 2020-07-28 12:46:16

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#708 2020-07-28 13:01:14

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#709 2020-07-28 18:37:58

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#710 2020-07-31 09:09:48

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#711 2020-07-31 09:46:22

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#712 2020-07-31 12:01:06

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#713 2020-07-31 15:57:39

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#714 2020-08-01 11:28:37

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#715 2020-08-02 00:18:04

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#716 2020-08-02 00:33:33

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#717 2020-08-02 01:24:45

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#718 2020-08-02 09:29:53

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

#719 2020-08-02 12:25:31

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#720 2020-08-02 21:27:53

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#721 2020-08-03 08:05:45

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#722 2020-08-03 11:59:17

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#723 2020-08-03 14:18:14

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#724 2020-08-03 14:44:02

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#725 2020-08-03 15:10:19

Re: why you choose ArchLinux?

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