[SOLVED] Considering Arch

CaptainKirk · 2009-06-07 09:43:47

EDIT: I have now installed Arch and am happy with it. The rest of this thread contains advice how to install Arch, beginning with the original post:

I recently went from Windows to Ubuntu and didn't like Ubuntu too much--it had bugs.

Now I have debian and I'm not so impressed either, unfortunately.

I have a friend who swears by Arch and wants me to try it. The reviews look very good BUT the install wiki page looks like hours of tinkering with things I've never heard of.

My friend claims that the whole process takes 20 minutes, including getting X installed with Xfce (which I like) and nivida (which I need). I'm not convinced, however.

I could install on top of debian and then the disk is already partitioned.

I presume that once I can get Xfce up and working I would be OK b/c then at least I can use my browser.

I will need to install LAMP so I can do PHP development on the machine but it appears that the installation of such is fairly easy with pacman. Seems everything is easy except the initial install.

Can anyone confirm or deny my friend's claims that really it's NOT so hard?

Thanks!

Last edited by CaptainKirk (2009-06-10 12:12:51)

lucke · 2009-06-07 09:52:25

You don't consider Arch, Arch considers you!

Yeah, it's really pretty easy, you just need to be able to read - and once you learn, nothing will take it away from you. It's worth it.

Allan · 2009-06-07 09:57:53

I recommend doing a bit of reading of the wiki and making your own decision:

http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Arch_Linux
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/The_Arch_Way
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/FAQ
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginners_Guide

Now as to the claim... I did a complete reinstall when I had a disk failure recently and I had what was nearly my final setup in ~20min. The first time I installed it took much longer; several hours to get mostly going and more time to acquire my version of perfection. But following the beginner/install guide should get you most of the way there. Just be prepared to spend a "bit" of time depending on how much you like tweaking things.

CaptainKirk · 2009-06-07 09:57:58

lucke wrote:

You don't consider Arch, Arch considers you!

LOL!

lucke wrote:

Yeah, it's really pretty easy, you just need to be able to read - and once you learn, nothing will take it away from you. It's worth it.

I need to be able to read? OK, I will work on that first and then install. Will give me a good excuse to postpone.

CaptainKirk · 2009-06-07 10:03:33

Allan wrote:

I recommend doing a bit of reading of the wiki and making your own decision:
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Arch_Linux
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/The_Arch_Way
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/FAQ
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginners_Guide

Yes, I have been reading. It was that last one there that scared me enough to start this thread.

Allan wrote:

Now as to the claim... I did a complete reinstall when I had a disk failure recently and I had what was nearly my final setup in ~20min. The first time I installed it took much longer; several hours to get mostly going and more time to acquire my version of perfection. But following the beginner/install guide should get you most of the way there. Just be prepared to spend a "bit" of time depending on how much you like tweaking things.

This is what I thought--on the *second* time around maybe it can be 20 minutes, but the first time around is 4 hours. OK, so four hours. Not too bad I guess. Heh heh.

Thanks.

fukawi2 · 2009-06-07 10:28:33

+1 for what Allan said. First time can take a while, and you'll probably reinstall a couple of times to get everything "just so" and each time it gets quicker and quicker. The main benefit is that you learn a lot more about Linux in general which you can then take with you if you don't like Arch.

(Warning: Arch is the Hotel California... You can checkout any time, but you can never leave )

CaptainKirk · 2009-06-07 10:52:52

fukawi2 wrote:

(Warning: Arch is the Hotel California... You can checkout any time, but you can never leave )

LOL

Well at least you guys have a sense of humor.

what should i get?

archlinux-2009.02-core-i686.iso
archlinux-2009.02-core-x86_64.iso

? I have 64 bit CPU and only 2 G RAM but I want to use Skype and Flash for Firefox and Opera--I must have Flash because I need to test websites. I think Skype and/or Flash may not have 64 bit versions. Probably 32 bit is easier, no?

snoblo · 2009-06-07 10:55:03

Many say arch is not for beginners, but I disagree with that. Arch was my first main distro I used - I had very little linux experience before installing it. Just follow the wiki especially the beginner's wiki (like Allan said). It does look very long-winded (and scary!) at first glance, but you can skip most of the stuff in it, especially those instructions that give multiple ways ways of doing the same thing. As the others said, you just need to know how to read!
Also another thing: when choosing packages during the install, make sure to install the wireless packages (if you use wireless internet) and check to see which drivers you need. I don't know why but even if both base and devel boxes are selected, I've found that I needed to manually select some of the individual packages in devel that were not selected by default.

Arch isn't really that hard though. You just need to learn how to use the command line interface exclusively until you get X working, which may be terribly easy or terribly hard depending on your hardware I used to use hwdetect to help get my X working, but after looking at the wiki now, it says hwdetect is deprecated, so you probably won't need it.
elinks is an easy text-based browser if you find yourself needing to browse the web without X

Last thing: if you follow the wiki guide and don't do anything stupid (hehe), it shouldn't take you FOUR hours unless you spend a lot of time configuring something. The actual install is pretty fast

Good luck!

EDIT:
I don't know much about 64-bit, but from what I hear it may be a bit difficult at first - I suggest looking here http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Arch64_FAQ

Last edited by snoblo (2009-06-07 10:59:12)

Xyne · 2009-06-07 11:03:05

CaptainKirk wrote:

... looks like hours of tinkering with things I've never heard of.

That's a large part of Arch. Because of it, you will get to know your system and gain more control over it, but if you're not prepared to do a lot of reading and tinkering in the beginning (and later on for various new things you'll need), then Arch probably isn't for you.

CaptainKirk wrote:

My friend claims that the whole process takes 20 minutes, including getting X installed with Xfce (which I like) and nivida (which I need). I'm not convinced, however.

It really depends on a few things, such as your hardware, what partitioning scheme you want to use (single, multiple, lvm, encryption, etc) and previous experience in setting up such things. It might take 20 minutes but it might take a lot more if you're unlucky.

CaptainKirk wrote:

Can anyone confirm or deny my friend's claims that really it's NOT so hard?

No one can answer that. You really have to just try it for yourself. Arch is a great distro and once you get the hang of it, it really is fun and simple and you will learn a lot along the way. It's not for everyone though and a lot of people who love Arch completely forget that not everyone wants the the same things when it comes to a distro so some people recommend it without considering the person to whom they're recommending it.

Allan · 2009-06-07 11:28:10

CaptainKirk wrote:

I have 64 bit CPU and only 2 G RAM but I want to use Skype and Flash for Firefox and Opera--I must have Flash because I need to test websites. I think Skype and/or Flash may not have 64 bit versions. Probably 32 bit is easier, no?

Go i686. Skype does not have a 64bit version so requires more work to setup on x86_64. Also, there is really no advantage going x86_64 with only 2Gb RAM

Raisuli · 2009-06-07 11:39:13

+1 to what snoblo said. I was relatively new to Linux when I installed Arch as well and it went just fine. The Beginner's Guide looks intimidating when you scroll through it, but once you start installing and follow it step by step it all makes sense.

CaptainKirk · 2009-06-07 11:44:36

Very good. I appreciate all the encouragement. One more question. Now that I have Debian up and running, is there anything I should write down or copy somewhere, like settings or hardware configs or anything? Just wondering if it might help when I install Arch.

Thanks.

madalu · 2009-06-07 11:52:39

I installed Arch for the first time about a month ago. I found the basic install to be as easy as any distro I've used. Since I've installed several other distros before, I'm familiar with Linux partitioning. (For the new Linux user, cfdisk might be a little bit intimidating. The other thing that might confuse new users is configuration via text files.)

What takes the most time, IMHO, is building up from the base install. (This is not much different than beginning with a Debian minimal install.) Most distros come with a preconfigured desktop environment. Arch does not. So it will take a while to install X and configure the gui. That's why the Beginner's Guide in the wiki is longer -- it takes you beyond the base install to discuss sound, xorg, wireless, etc.

Good luck!

graysky · 2009-06-07 12:44:25

+1 for Arch i686 in your case... you only need x86_64 if you have >4 gigs of memory.
+1 for what others have said regarding the first install of Arch and learning curve. The beginners guide referenced above is a great starting place. Once you get it up and running, I would recommend keeping track of your packages in a text file (this is advice I would give if you were running Debian or Ubuntu also). If you ever do wanna do a reinstall of Arch, once you're at your base system, you can simply grab all your fav packages, copy your home dir over and you'd be good to go.

Peasantoid · 2009-06-07 14:20:37

You only need 64-bit if:
1) You're working with really data-intensive applications.
2) You have 4+ GB of memory.
3) You need really big integers.

That said, Flash does have a 64-bit version. Works fine for me.

stryder · 2009-06-07 14:22:38

CaptainKirk wrote:

Very good. I appreciate all the encouragement. One more question. Now that I have Debian up and running, is there anything I should write down or copy somewhere, like settings or hardware configs or anything? Just wondering if it might help when I install Arch.
Thanks.

The config for arch is basically /etc/rc.conf. The beginners guide walks you through it. The most crucial part (apart from the initial setup like partitions, etc, which I assume you are familiar) is getting internet access.

It might be a good idea to save your xorg.conf somewhere and use once you have installed X and your nvidia driver, although xorg these days can even run without a conf good to have a standby.

Be aware that arch install is not point and click, but typing commands and configuring using a text editor.

It is a good idea to have read through the guide and have a rough understanding of the steps in installation before you start.

Last edited by stryder (2009-06-07 14:23:08)

CaptainKirk · 2009-06-07 14:31:23

I plan to write over my existing partitions, so that's all set. And even if not, I would just boot up a liveCD or another OS installer to make the partitions.

I have

200M for /boot
4 G swap
25 G /
100 G /var
190 G /home

I would mount the last 2 but NOT format them--they have my data.

So I would mount the first 3 and format them and install there. Also install grub in MBR I guess. Makes sense?

graysky wrote:

Once you get it up and running, I would recommend keeping track of your packages in a text file (this is advice I would give if you were running Debian or Ubuntu also). If you ever do wanna do a reinstall of Arch, once you're at your base system, you can simply grab all your fav packages, copy your home dir over and you'd be good to go.

Interesting. But wouldn't one want normally just to use this method: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Pac … re_Restore of automatically obtaining that list?

Pudge · 2009-06-07 14:41:26

Take a look at this installation giude.

Pudge

fukawi2 · 2009-06-07 23:59:19

CaptainKirk wrote:

I plan to write over my existing partitions, so that's all set. And even if not, I would just boot up a liveCD or another OS installer to make the partitions.
I have
200M for /boot
4 G swap
25 G /
100 G /var
190 G /home
I would mount the last 2 but NOT format them--they have my data.
So I would mount the first 3 and format them and install there. Also install grub in MBR I guess. Makes sense?

That's quite a large /var partition... How much of it is used? Personally I would back that up to your /home partition and format that too, then anything you need you can extract from the backup, and you still get the benefit of having a clean start with /var

CaptainKirk · 2009-06-08 08:21:14

fukawi2 wrote:

That's quite a large /var partition... How much of it is used? Personally I would back that up to your /home partition and format that too, then anything you need you can extract from the backup, and you still get the benefit of having a clean start with /var

Here it is:

fred@debian:~$ df -h
Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/sda3              23G  3.1G   19G  15% /
tmpfs                1014M     0 1014M   0% /lib/init/rw
udev                   10M  132K  9.9M   2% /dev
tmpfs                1014M     0 1014M   0% /dev/shm
/dev/sda1             183M   37M  137M  22% /boot
/dev/sda6             175G   31G  136G  19% /home
/dev/sda5              92G  9.7G   78G  12% /var

Is there a benefit of a clean /var? I could do that I suppose. My space is taken with web files in /var/www and MySQL data. I could copy those to /home however and then copy back afterward.

EDIT: One more question. I backed up a copy of

cat /etc/network/interfaces
cat /etc/X11/xort.conf
cat /etc/fstab
cat /etc/hosts
cat /boot/grub/menu.lst

anything else I should back up that might help with the install?

Last edited by CaptainKirk (2009-06-08 08:26:45)

.:B:. · 2009-06-08 09:41:00

No offense, but a 100 GB /var partition... That is a bit huge.

I have a 2 GB /var partition. I don't know what you're stashing in your /var but /var is intended for 'fluctuating' content (log files, state files, etc).

Also, if you don't need a /boot, don't do it. Only complicates your setup and the juggling with partitions can be difficult as is already.

CaptainKirk · 2009-06-08 10:07:48

B wrote:

No offense, but a 100 GB /var partition... That is a bit huge.
I have a 2 GB /var partition. I don't know what you're stashing in your /var but /var is intended for 'fluctuating' content (log files, state files, etc).

In Debian at least the ApacheRoot files are stored there and the MySQL data files. My /var/www is 7G with web files including PSDs and backups etc. and my /var/lib/mysql has another 1G with MySQL files.

B wrote:

Also, if you don't need a /boot, don't do it. Only complicates your setup and the juggling with partitions can be difficult as is already.

Oh. No, I don't need it. In Debian I was advised to use that.

fukawi2 · 2009-06-08 10:17:05

CaptainKirk wrote:

Is there a benefit of a clean /var? I could do that I suppose. My space is taken with web files in /var/www and MySQL data. I could copy those to /home however and then copy back afterward.

It makes sure nothing conflicts (permissions issues or different program versions for example), and makes sure you're not carrying dead data there. Arch by default stores Apache's home in /srv/http so I'd just backup your WWW and MySQL data and take that across to your Arch install.

CaptainKirk wrote:

EDIT: One more question. I backed up a copy of
cat /etc/network/interfaces
cat /etc/X11/xort.conf
cat /etc/fstab
cat /etc/hosts
cat /boot/grub/menu.lst
anything else I should back up that might help with the install?

Networking is done completely different in Arch compared to Debian so your interfaces file will serve as nothing other than reference for you.
Havin your xorg.conf file could be handy depending on your setup, but we have the newest version of xorg with uses hot-plugging so I'd recommending trying to use that first before fiddling with a conf file (start hal and dbus, then start X without /etc/X11/xorg.conf)
fstab will most likely be slightly different, so probably only useful for reference.
hosts you should be able to drop straight in.
Your Grub config will be generated for you, so again, use it for reference when checking that the default generated one is correct.

Last edited by fukawi2 (2009-06-08 10:17:36)

CaptainKirk · 2009-06-08 15:25:24

Follow up AFTER Install

To get Xfce up and running took 3 hours total. Although it took one hour to figure out that I needed hal. I also had my friend with me on Skype to help. Well OTOH might have taken 2 hours without his help. Hope he doesn't read this. LOL.

Anyway the basic install (until X) was actually trivial for me. I didn't have to edit ANY of the config files. I made two small edits but they were optional. Basically all the files were right.

And as soon as I got hal going, X started right up with the nivida driver I installed.

Thank you very much to all those who provided assistance. I really appreciate it.

methuselah · 2009-06-08 20:20:26

CaptainKirk wrote:

My friend claims that the whole process takes 20 minutes, including getting X installed with Xfce (which I like) and nivida (which I need). I'm not convinced, however.

I think 20 minutes is exaggerated a bit.....

If you know what you're doing when configuring all of the different Arch conf files, and if you use the FTP install method for the newest packages and you have a high-speed eth0 connection that works and is easily detected/configured with DHCP, then it can be a very, very, fast install. (especially if all your hardware is easily detected out of the box)

Then creating a user account and then adding the packages of: xorg, xf86-input-evdev, nvidia, and nvidia-utils is very easy.

running this command will configure your xorg.conf file for nvidia:

nvidia-xconfig --composite

CaptainKirk wrote:

I presume that once I can get Xfce up and working I would be OK b/c then at least I can use my browser.

After you've properly installed and tested X11 with nvidia, and have configured all of your files properly then you can add xfce4 for your desktop with:

pacman -S xfce4 xfce4-goodies gtk2-themes-collection firefox

If you have configured all of your conf files properly, added a display manager like SLIM if you needed one, and have configured the ~./xinitrc to use whatever method you will be logging in with, then you should be able to reboot and log into a perfectly working xfce4 desktop using firefox on Arch.

CaptainKirk wrote:

Can anyone confirm or deny my friend's claims that really it's NOT so hard?
Thanks!

The first install isn't really difficult..... it's just a bit of reading and figuring out what parts apply to you..... once you learn it, then using the FTP install method can make it very easy to get through an install quickly. When I first installed Arch in 2007 I used the Arch Beginners Guide along with this VERY OLD GUIDE that has easy "step-by-step" pictures (10 pages): http://www.raiden.net/?cat=2&aid=276

CaptainKirk wrote:

.... I think Skype and/or Flash may not have 64 bit versions. Probably 32 bit is easier, no?

Arch has had the 64bit Flashplugin in the extra repository for a while now, and the AUR package was available before that..... same thing goes for the JRE 64bit plugin "jre_beta" and the AUR package that stays updating with the newest version as soon as it comes out..... and even before those official/unofficial 64bit Adobe/Java plugins were available Archlinux had workarounds such as the nspluginwrapper, or open source alternatives like the OpenJDK6 "Iced Tea" plugin...... I've never used Skype but I know people have AUR packages for it: http://aur.archlinux.org/packages.php?O … =0&K=Skype

Last edited by methuselah (2009-06-08 20:44:10)

Arch Linux

#1 2009-06-07 09:43:47

[SOLVED] Considering Arch

#2 2009-06-07 09:52:25

Re: [SOLVED] Considering Arch

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#23 2009-06-08 10:17:05

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#24 2009-06-08 15:25:24

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#25 2009-06-08 20:20:26

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