Arch Linux

hybrid

Member

Registered: 2007-02-05

Posts: 262

installing tarballs into Arch's package system

Hi,
I am using Slackware for about 4 years now (before that other distributions) and I have always been very happy with it. I absolutely love Slackware's simplicity, especially in it's pkgtool. But that's also what's been pissing me of more and more: the software repository is small and especially after Pat dropped gnome resolving dependencies can be a huge bitch (and swaret + linuxpackages.net just isn't cutting it). So I happened to think about alternatives and believe it or not, I am thinking about Arch.
But I was wondering whether Arch packages come with something like a buildscript sothat I can see what options a package was built with? What if I want to compile my own package? Can I integrate my package into Arch's packet manager easily (maybe somewhat like checkinstall)?

"a simple, lightweight linux distribution" sounds pretty much like good ol' Slack but what does it mean for arch Linux? Why "should" people use arch instead of other distris (say, Slackware? )?
Well I never thought I would ever ask questions like that but unfortunately my internet connection sucks and so I can't just download any distribution to try it out and so I chose to ask these questions (after I read the Newbie Corner's title :>).

Alright, thank you very much for reading and for your answers in advance,
Stefan aka hybrid

hybrid

Member

Registered: 2007-02-05

Posts: 262

Re: installing tarballs into Arch's package system

Wow, perfect timing, I just stumbled upon this thread (http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=21668). So I guess there are tools for that but can anyone recommend them or are they not really that great?

hightower

Member

Registered: 2006-04-02

Posts: 182

Re: installing tarballs into Arch's package system

Hi,

for every package in Arch Linux, there are PKGBUILDs available which amongst others provide the information which options were used to build it. You can access these PKGBUILDs with the abs tool or the Arch Linux website.

It is possible to integrate "foreign" packages into pacman (Arch package manager).

Further information are available through the Arch wiki.

hightower

Last edited by hightower (2007-02-05 18:10:28)

elasticdog

Member

From: Washington, USA

Registered: 2005-05-02

Posts: 995

Website

Re: installing tarballs into Arch's package system

But I was wondering whether Arch packages come with something like a buildscript sothat I can see what options a package was built with? What if I want to compile my own package? Can I integrate my package into Arch's packet manager easily (maybe somewhat like checkinstall)?

Once you have a running system, issuing the "abs" command will automatically pull down all of the PKGBUILDs used to create the packages in the official repos.  It is trivially easy to change those configurations and rebuild the package so they can still be maintained by pacman...it's really a great mix of tools to help manage both binary and built-from-source packages.  Have look around the wiki as there are a number of articles that can help to explain the differences/advantages/disadvantages to running Arch.  It sounds to me like you'd like it here though, so welcom aboard!

mucknert

Member

From: Berlin // Germany

Registered: 2006-06-27

Posts: 510

Re: installing tarballs into Arch's package system

Hi,
I am using Slackware for about 4 years now (before that other distributions) and I have always been very happy with it. I absolutely love Slackware's simplicity, especially in it's pkgtool. But that's also what's been pissing me of more and more: the software repository is small and especially after Pat dropped gnome resolving dependencies can be a huge bitch (and swaret + linuxpackages.net just isn't cutting it). So I happened to think about alternatives and believe it or not, I am thinking about Arch.

Good. Let's get started then.

But I was wondering whether Arch packages come with something like a buildscript sothat I can see what options a package was built with? What if I want to compile my own package? Can I integrate my package into Arch's packet manager easily (maybe somewhat like checkinstall)?

Elasticdog already told you about abs and PKGBUILDs. So I get a little bit more technical on the way packages are created for Arch. Instead of checkinstall, which can be pretty unreliable at times, the Software gets installed in a special Prefix which gets analyzed and packed up together with the metadata to form the Package. Pretty straight-forward, eh? With a little bit of time and dedication you can put almost anything into an Arch-Package. So definately yes, you can integrate your packages into pacman and that is relatively easy.

"a simple, lightweight linux distribution" sounds pretty much like good ol' Slack but what does it mean for arch Linux? Why "should" people use arch instead of other distris (say, Slackware? )?
Well I never thought I would ever ask questions like that but unfortunately my internet connection sucks and so I can't just download any distribution to try it out and so I chose to ask these questions (after I read the Newbie Corner's title :>).

http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/The_Arch_Way
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Arc … er_Distros
That should cover it. Did for me.

Alright, thank you very much for reading and for your answers in advance,
Stefan aka hybrid

You're welcome.

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