Archlinux for a stable workstation?

crid · 2010-06-26 00:58:39

Hi All,

I'm a long time Linux user,programmer and a Free Software supporter. I bought a new workstation which will be my main development machine for various projects.

Currently, I'm looking a distro to install. Everything about Archlinux looks great, good collection of packages,bsd style init and so on. But, how suitable Archlinux is for a real work development workstation? I'm asking this because I don't have too much experience with these "rolling release" - distributions.

I need my machine to be stable and reliable. Of course I could just go and install Debian stable or Cent Os or something, but it would be nice to have new versions of gcc,gdb and emacs and various other tools. That's why I find Archlinux to be interesting.

So, how stable it is? How often it breaks after upgrade? I don't want to start any flame wars or anything.

graysky · 2010-06-26 01:14:59

I think you'll be very happy with it. Things rarely 'break' and when they do it's usually something minor with a quick fix. I've been a happy arch user for over a year now and haven't seen any major breakage.

demian · 2010-06-26 01:40:31

Welcome to the forum,

personally, I've had just one major breakage. I had enabled the "testing" repository and updated from it just when there was a broken openssl package (and maybe some others) which led to a nonfunctional system. But when you stick to the stable repositories you'll have a very stable system. I've had only one or two broken packages in the last year. In both cases a providing package was updated and changed internally while the dependant package didn't have time to catch up. Sometimes, very rarely, there are upgrades like Xorg 1.7 -> 1.8 where you'll have to adjust a little (here policy files no longer provided by hal but by xorg directly).
There's really not much maintenance required. I've had maybe four incidents in ~14 months, three of which could be solved in less than 10 minutes.

Greets,
demian

TomB17 · 2010-06-26 02:31:58

crid wrote:

... how suitable Archlinux is for a real work development workstation? I'm asking this because I don't have too much experience with these "rolling release" - distributions.
I need my machine to be stable and reliable................ it would be nice to have new versions of gcc,gdb and emacs and various other tools.

You're never going to have absolute stability and stay on the leading edge. If you want new versions of development tools, you're going to have the odd glitch.

Having said that, I've found Arch way more stable than kubuntu or debian. I don't think it's quite on the level of CentOS.

For a development workstation (that's what I do too), I think Arch is ultimate.

ralvez · 2010-06-26 03:08:50

My 2 development workstations and my demo laptop use ArchLinux.
I have not had problems with them but in a couple of occasions, and each of them has been kernel related. In other words, a kernel upgrade broke something.
So ... I NEVER do a kernel upgrade on them prior or during an important project.
That's it. My workstations are ROCK solid.

Usually, though, you can do a downgrading of the kernel and the problem would go away too ... but you do not want that kind of stress when you know you need your system at top performance.

thisllub · 2010-06-29 12:33:07

I have had more problems with Debian and Centos.
Pacman never goes out of date, other package managers eventually seem to break dependencies.

KlavKalashj · 2010-06-29 13:00:31

I guess it depends a bit on your hardware, especially graphics card. My laptop is all-intel and it's rock solid, even with testing enabled. I think you will be fine, just be a bit careful, keep an eye in the forum and news page before you update, and don't enable the testing repository.

Kosmonavt · 2010-06-29 15:39:09

I actually use Arch as primary system for study, which is connected also with programming. IMO, Debian (I had a lot of experience with 4, 5 and 6 versions) is sometimes more stable, but sometimes it requires more time to cope with hardware issues, while in Arch it's much easier. Also, some development tools are outdated there (e.g., even in Debian experimental Bluefish is only terribly old 1.3 version). And pacman is more logical than aptitude (and probably faster).

But be careful, don't use too much of AUR, as you'll need to rebuild a lot of packages after kernel upgrade etc.

ozar · 2010-06-29 16:04:22

crid wrote:

So, how stable it is? How often it breaks after upgrade?

Hello and welcome to the forums, and to Arch!

Any time that you upgrade packages there is a chance for breakage, but I've been running Arch for more than 5 years now and during that time have never even considered moving to another distro. I update packages daily and have had a few breakages along the way, but never one that put my system totally out of use. Of course, I do keep images of my system partitions so if the system should ever go down totally, I can quickly restore the system image and then keep going until the problem that caused the breakage is fixed. I'd recommend that all computer users keep backup images on hand for that purpose.

Hope it all works out well for you, regardless of which distro that you choose to go with!

Bralkein · 2010-06-29 21:42:46

Yes, as long as you don't enable the testing repository you should be fine. The amount of work you have to do is IMO less than the yearly (or so) upgrades you do with a fixed-release distro, especially since you won't have to enable special repositories just to get the latest versions of GCC etc. TBH even if you do enable the testing repo you're unlikely to run into serious trouble. Rolling release sounds like a crazy idea but it really does work surprisingly well.

JohnVV · 2010-06-29 22:12:18

i have only had some very minor problems since i moved from fedora
but i also have centos5.5 installed for the things that will not run in a very new OS

sand_man · 2010-06-29 23:38:58

My laptop has been stable for years until my screen broke but that's hardly Arch's fault

mikesd · 2010-06-30 01:17:48

Bralkein wrote:

Yes, as long as you don't enable the testing repository you should be fine. <snip> TBH even if you do enable the testing repo you're unlikely to run into serious trouble. Rolling release sounds like a crazy idea but it really does work surprisingly well.

Agreed. I haven't enabled testing on my main workstation and have found it to be as stable Ubuntu or Debian. Only one or two issues and neither was critical. A temporary downgrade fixed it. Quite a few developers seem to use Arch Linux.

fukawi2 · 2010-06-30 04:10:46

I had to stop using Arch on my work desktop and laptop because I couldn't continue to spend the time I was maintaining it. I now use Fedora for both work machines.

I still use Arch at home though where I can devote the time to fixing the problems that do come up.

bananaoomarang · 2010-06-30 20:11:04

I find arch pretty stable to be honest (as long as you don't enable the testing repo) new kernels, xorg, mesa etc are kept back and tested well before release.

gaunt · 2010-07-01 00:19:58

I have [testing] enabled, have about 40 packages (including all my web browsers) from AUR, and I've never gotten a serious breakage on my system that wasn't directly traceable to me poking at parts of my system that were doing fine on their own. Heck, I wouldn't even have noticed the transition to Xorg 1.8 if I hadn't been eagerly watching for it to get out of it's own repository. It was almost a letdown to have my touchpad work out of the box.

We have a lot of users who test the heck out of anything, and we have a some exotic systems set up that tend to stress test (*cough* Allan *cough*), so by the time a package hits mainstream it has a right to be there. Linus's Law: Given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow (or something like that).

That said, I think the same applies to any distro with a sufficient userbase, so you should be good as long whatever you choose as long as you pay attention to any sort of warning notices sent out before an upgrade.

shetland_breeder · 2010-07-01 08:40:48

I hope it makes for a stable workstation as I've just moved mine from Ubuntu 8.04 to Arch.

I got fed up with having old old version of key software, and Ubuntu's 6-month release schedule seems to make for instability rather than the reverse. And the LTS release is just another unfinished 6-monthly release with security patches. You have to wait for the second point release and then keep your fingers crossed that the upgrade works.

Applying updates in penny packets seems a much better approach. I have a second instance of Arch set up to duplicate the main instance so I can install any big updates (X, kernel, critical software) on that first to be sure it works for me. 10GB is plenty.

And Arch is so much better documented than Ubuntu.

And it also works really well on my Thinkpad T23 (PIII 1.3G, 348MB, Savage video).

Pete

Arch Linux

#1 2010-06-26 00:58:39

Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#2 2010-06-26 01:14:59

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#3 2010-06-26 01:40:31

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#4 2010-06-26 02:31:58

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#5 2010-06-26 03:08:50

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#6 2010-06-29 12:33:07

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#7 2010-06-29 13:00:31

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#8 2010-06-29 15:39:09

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#9 2010-06-29 16:04:22

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#10 2010-06-29 21:42:46

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#11 2010-06-29 22:12:18

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#12 2010-06-29 23:38:58

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#13 2010-06-30 01:17:48

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#14 2010-06-30 04:10:46

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#15 2010-06-30 20:11:04

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#16 2010-07-01 00:19:58

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

#17 2010-07-01 08:40:48

Re: Archlinux for a stable workstation?

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