Automating Arch Installation

mbrown · 2012-10-12 20:40:20

Is there a way to automate Arch installation with the current installation media (2012.10.06)?

I'm thinking of something like RedHat / Fedora's Kickstart files that allow you to do the steps mentioned in the Official Install Guide (partitioning disks, installing packages, creating users, etc) in an automated way....

karol · 2012-10-12 20:43:32

There are some scripts and frameworks floating around in the forum e.g. https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=149597
You'll have to check if they do everything you want.

Antoine · 2012-10-12 20:44:22

Sounds like you're looking for a graphical installer. How would your system know what hostname that you to use? Or what timezone you were in? Or what users to create?

Archbang and Manjaro offer that kind of thing; both result in an Archlinux install, no?

karol · 2012-10-12 20:45:19

Antoine wrote:

Archbang and Manjaro offer that kind of thing; both result in an Archlinux install, no?

No.

jasonwryan · 2012-10-12 20:45:34

Antoine wrote:

Archbang and Manjaro offer that kind of thing; both result in an Archlinux install, no?

No. Neither Archbang nor Manjaro result in an Arch install. That's why neither are supported here.

mbrown · 2012-10-12 20:53:28

Antoine wrote:

Sounds like you're looking for a graphical installer.

No.

Antoine wrote:

How would your system know what hostname that you to use? Or what timezone you were in? Or what users to create?

This stuff would be specified in a configuration file like in a Kickstart installation.

karol wrote:

There are some scripts and frameworks floating around in the forum e.g. https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=149597

This is exactly the kind of thing I was looking for, thanks! It would be great if something like this became mainstream/widely used, doing installations interactively doesn't scale well...

DSpider · 2012-10-13 10:29:30

mbrown wrote:

This is exactly the kind of thing I was looking for, thanks! It would be great if something like this became mainstream/widely used, doing installations interactively doesn't scale well...

Except that you're probably not gonna learn anything that way... I thought about this for a while, and I realized that It's not really worth it. You're installing once in a blue moon anyway (I'm still rocking the same Arch i686 install I did on an old Athlon XP 2200+, from four years ago!), and if you have multiple computers, install once and transfer it to the other ones either from a portable USB drive or through the network.

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Fu … with_rsync
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Mi … w_hardware

Antoine · 2012-10-15 19:14:43

jasonwryan wrote:

No. Neither Archbang nor Manjaro result in an Arch install. That's why neither are supported here.

Fair enough. I once had an Archbang install that I found more difficult to install and maintain than the official Arch. I've since deleted it (it was in VM, so that was easy).

altercation · 2012-10-16 20:28:04

DSpider wrote:

mbrown wrote:
This is exactly the kind of thing I was looking for, thanks! It would be great if something like this became mainstream/widely used, doing installations interactively doesn't scale well...
Except that you're probably not gonna learn anything that way... I thought about this for a while, and I realized that It's not really worth it. You're installing once in a blue moon anyway (I'm still rocking the same Arch i686 install I did on an old Athlon XP 2200+, from four years ago!), and if you have multiple computers, install once and transfer it to the other ones either from a portable USB drive or through the network.

I'm the developer of the above linked to archblocks script/modules and wanted to weigh in on this issue. I actually would like to see archblocks used for learning about arch as well as installing it. Part of the intent behind it was to make each step (block) comprehensible.

I look at the archblocks "blocks" as a link between automated installation and the wiki. Something along the lines of literate programming. And, of course, the benefit is that you get a potentially fully automated install of a very customized system.

Anyhow, just wanted to let you know that I share the value of learning through doing and hope that the archblocks scripts can contribute to that as well

ksovi · 2012-10-17 16:56:41

to be fair, you don't really learn that much by installing arch.

DSpider wrote:

mbrown wrote:
This is exactly the kind of thing I was looking for, thanks! It would be great if something like this became mainstream/widely used, doing installations interactively doesn't scale well...
Except that you're probably not gonna learn anything that way... I thought about this for a while, and I realized that It's not really worth it. You're installing once in a blue moon anyway (I'm still rocking the same Arch i686 install I did on an old Athlon XP 2200+, from four years ago!), and if you have multiple computers, install once and transfer it to the other ones either from a portable USB drive or through the network.
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Fu … with_rsync
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Mi … w_hardware

DSpider · 2012-10-17 18:48:28

ksovi wrote:

to be fair, you don't really learn that much by installing arch.

You are introduced to the basics of Linux: ping, nano, pacman (this being the exception, I guess, because it's specific to Arch Linux), partitioning, filesystems, mount/umount in the proper order, lsblk (and the difference between /dev/sda and /dev/sda1), fstab, hostname + hosts, Syslinux/GRUB/EFISTUB, UEFI booting, sudo, Xorg, etc.

A beginner has plenty to learn just from the install process. Hiding these configuration files and automating the process is against The Arch Way.

Last edited by DSpider (2012-10-17 18:51:54)

altercation · 2012-10-17 20:17:10

DSpider wrote:

ksovi wrote:
to be fair, you don't really learn that much by installing arch.
You are introduced to the basics of Linux: ping, nano, pacman (this being the exception, I guess, because it's specific to Arch Linux), partitioning, filesystems, mount/umount in the proper order, lsblk (and the difference between /dev/sda and /dev/sda1), fstab, hostname + hosts, Syslinux/GRUB/EFISTUB, UEFI booting, sudo, Xorg, etc.
A beginner has plenty to learn just from the install process. Hiding these configuration files and automating the process is against The Arch Way.

I agree. But I also believe in DRY (don't repeat yourself) and thus I take a lot of notes about how I set up my Arch systems. Often these notes contain code or *are* simply well documented scripts. This is all the ArchBlocks project really is at its heart. I don't see it working at *all* for beginners... it's simply too complex, but for veterans that want to translate their notes into an installer, I think it's a good solution.

kaizoku · 2016-11-12 01:15:42

Found this pretty cool article that lets you automate your Arch Linux installation with some bash scripts, it's pretty cool and targets towards server deployments. I hope you guys find it useful.

https://shirotech.com/linux/how-to-auto … stallation

Last edited by kaizoku (2016-11-12 01:16:28)

Alad · 2016-11-12 07:05:21

Necrobumping a 4 year-old thread with what's basically an installer script... just use a PKGBUILD containing your system configurations.

jasonwryan · 2016-11-12 07:41:59

Indeed...

Closing.

Arch Linux

#1 2012-10-12 20:40:20

Automating Arch Installation

#2 2012-10-12 20:43:32

Re: Automating Arch Installation

#3 2012-10-12 20:44:22

Re: Automating Arch Installation

#4 2012-10-12 20:45:19

Re: Automating Arch Installation

#5 2012-10-12 20:45:34

Re: Automating Arch Installation

#6 2012-10-12 20:53:28

Re: Automating Arch Installation

#7 2012-10-13 10:29:30

Re: Automating Arch Installation

#8 2012-10-15 19:14:43

Re: Automating Arch Installation

#9 2012-10-16 20:28:04

Re: Automating Arch Installation

#10 2012-10-17 16:56:41

Re: Automating Arch Installation

#11 2012-10-17 18:48:28

Re: Automating Arch Installation

#12 2012-10-17 20:17:10

Re: Automating Arch Installation

#13 2016-11-12 01:15:42

Re: Automating Arch Installation

#14 2016-11-12 07:05:21

Re: Automating Arch Installation

#15 2016-11-12 07:41:59

Re: Automating Arch Installation

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