The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

ablepharus · 2010-07-28 20:03:41

Nothing is more awesome than archlinux with awesome. I never had such a simple and fast system

nXqd · 2010-08-02 12:41:57

simple, fast, efficient > Arch linux
This is the first distro I've stayed this long when I move from windows . a little research and arch is the one
I'm gonna try gentoo in the meantime.
I linux: honestly kde is not for me, dwm fight the way \m/

psyodin · 2010-08-03 08:14:41

i have done the usual distro hopping over the years. so far i like arch the bestest of all, although linux mint and #!are also nice distros. once i found and learned some arch, never wanted anyone else.

i have brought my wife along (non-geekish) for the ride over that same time period, her major complaint was "its always diifferent and things always change". When she got her own laptop i dual booted win7 and #! as she likes openbox alot. but alas even #! changed. soooo i dual booted win7 with arch, let her pick exactly what she wanted as she had been exposed to alot of choices in programs etc over the years. for some reason i thought arch wouldnt work with a non geek that well, but its been awesome. once set up it doesnt change from her perspective, which is good for the IT person, me. i have to say the purple theme and comic sans can* be a bit much at times. She honestly loves her arch box, even though she barely understands what a terminal is. i have taught her $killall lately. heh. "i love my computer" and "my computer never locks up" are nice to hear form her.

the dual boot is for a garmin gps.....the last connecton to windows she has...

anyway arch is the best, although my gentoo buddy disagrees a never ending disagreement there....

very greatful and all that

Last edited by psyodin (2010-08-03 08:16:21)

mhertz · 2010-08-03 09:47:28

I'm a GNU/Linux newbie(2-3 month) and absolutelly love Arch Linux, which is my only OS(Coupled with Openbox without panels/taskbars or other stuff for kiddies ), and which to me provides the very best charistics of Slackware and freebsd, coupled with the rolling release model of Gentoo!

Also, I just simply love AIF, which provides us with easy methods of making 100% unattended(automatic) installs, as this is a feature which if not existed, would be one of the only things that I would mis from win32(i.e. the winnt.sif answer file functionality from the MS deployment-tools). I absolutelly hate making manual installs of any OS...

At first I thought that the auto-deps-resolving feature of Arch actually did go against the "Arch Way", but after learning about Arch's deviding of deps into needed and opt-deps, then i realize that it goes perfectly hand in hand with that, since the downside of auto-deps-resolvement is avoided i.e. nothing unneeded is automatically added(but solely the things needed to make the app run and not crash), and only the upside is retained i.e. the cumbersome job of tracking deps is avoided!

Provided that Arch never leaves it's philosophy of not adding GUI tools/installers, and keeping everything leightweight and "KISS", then i'm for sure never going to need to distro-hop ever again!

The only very small and nit-picky thing I can put a finger on, is that I personally don't feel that the bootlogo kernel "patching" is going hand in hand with Arch's slackware-like "vanilla-philosophy" of only patching(or adding branding) in very rare cases and only for avoiding breakage, preserve important functionality or otherwise important things, but oh-well, such a small thing i can live with!

Thanks to all the Arch devs for making such an awesome distro; it's very much appreciated!

CU, Martin.

Last edited by mhertz (2010-08-03 11:10:13)

Toshiro · 2010-08-06 09:11:52

I've been using Arch Linux for about 2 years now.
I tried before several distros and I always got something broken or not working. It was a real 'fun' to spend hours and days to try to make it work.
But I discovered Arch Linux...
And since then everything works...
No more headaches because the version upgrade failed...
Arch Linux is not fun!
I hate Arch Linux!

kcirick · 2010-08-06 13:21:06

I've been using Arch Linux for about 3 years now.

I think using linux is simple for everyone, but figuring out problems on linux/tailoring it for your system is hard for most people. Arch makes it very easy for this (unlike other giants).

I'm loving the community and support, and I visit wiki/forum every day (dangerous, I think!). I'll be donating once I can afford to!

pablokal · 2010-08-07 21:38:17

I would like to see a more critical default attitude towards Arch.
From criticism comes amelioration.
This sounds more like a Chinese communist meeting everybody praising the Party.
I 've never read stories here of people who broke their system and turned their back on Arch.
I did read them on other forums. So why not here?
There is a kind of geek machismo here on which certain things are ok and others raise doubt on you as potential noob
or whatever. Many opinions seem very predictable.
That said I must say I never have serious problems until now with Arch and that I was helped very well and fast and kind the one or two times I asked for support. That the forum and the wiki is a great place to learn and the fact that I use Arch as my daily distro is the best compliment I can give.

mhertz · 2010-08-07 22:31:27

I don't think it's strange that ppl are very positive towards Arch around here, as this is the Arch Linux forum, where ppl generally register to, because they love the distro...

Also, as this is a very minimal system and were you are in charge of pretty much everything, then there's few things to bitch about, compared to most all other distros around...

Why you don't see much threads here about ppl breaking their systems, is probably because Arch and this forum is generally meant for intermidiate to experienced users, and that breaking your system without it being your own fault, is very rare indeed, as there's a testing repo available, and that the dev team here generally are very capable, I have a feeling about, and that every intermidiate user should know that having a backup of your complete system and inportant data is simply elementary computing 1 on 1...

Just my 2 cents...

Gremnon · 2010-08-08 18:13:40

pablokal, talk to anyone here, and there'll most likely be some problem they've once had with Arch. Gods know that I've had my own collection of issues, from attempts to install it on an ancient laptop with no optical driver or USB ports, to my latest issue of a new laptop and a stubborn Nvidia driver - but we overcome those problems.
And that's what I like about Arch - people are right when they say that 99% of the answers are on the Wiki, and if the Wiki doesn't have it, it probably will by the time someone's asked and got the answer for it.

By far, I've had the least issues with Arch than any other distro, and to date, I've tried Fedora (8, 10, 12 and 13), Ubuntu (Everything from 8.04 to 9.10), Debian Lenny, Gentoo briefly (I don't have the patience to watch it compile everything. Arch doesn't compile everything, and offers just as much choice as Gentoo), OpenSuSE, Archbang and Crunchbang, Slackware, Wolvix, Mandriva, PC-BSD and even OpenSolaris once. All of them have had more issues than I have found with Arch. Ubuntu can claim to 'just work' but Arch 'just works' far better.

In short? Arch rules.

XGaryG · 2010-08-09 01:24:14

I have tried pretty much every distro out there.
I get them installed, they seem unique, then I tire of them and go back to searching for a new flavor.

With Arch Linux, every time I use it, I am more impressed.
Its not that it is not for the 'Point and click' types that it is a plus,
it it more configurable than I had even hoped for,
the 'rolling version' concept means more than I realized,
and being 'Bleeding Edge' is a nice point, but it still seems stable.

I am thinking this is finally the distribution that will keep me satisfied.

Lets hope it stays that way.

mhertz · 2010-08-09 08:10:01

Rant: Ppl, lets please stop with the "bleading edge" term with regards to Arch Linux! It's mentioned many official places like the wiki, homepage etc. Arch is cutting edge! As in latest stable releases, and not latest dev-snapshot, alpha, beta or rc which bleading edge reffers to!

Sorry for off-topic, and please don't take this personally XGaryG, as it's not about you, but I just really think that this wrong terminology needs to be stopped!

End of rant and sorry again

ixnine · 2010-08-13 14:29:24

redacted

Last edited by ixnine (2011-10-02 13:00:10)

infiniteh · 2010-08-14 05:51:13

I've been using Arch for less than a week now, and I absolutely love it! I consider myself an intermediate Linux user, having used numerous distros for about a decade, the last 6 to 8 years of which were spent primarily with Slackware. Interestingly, Arch came out on top in a recent poll at linuxquestions.org asking which distro people would run if Slackware disappeared tomorrow. Though I had known about Arch for years, that poll sparked my interest. So here I am.

What do I like about Arch? Hmm, I think the first few pages listed on the Main Page of the wiki tell it all. I like the fact that my old Inspiron B130 is running faster than ever (Arch + i3 + dzen2 + conky = heaven). Also, rather oddly perhaps, I love the use of bashisms in core scripts. Might as well make the most of Bash 4.

I can't say I'm a Slackware convert, as it will continue to be my main desktop distro for a while. My laptop, however, will forever run Arch.

Thanks to the devs and all the contributors. Great work!

(btw, if that poll was mentioned earlier in this thread, sorry... I didn't feel like reading 19 pages of posts)

EDIT: to stay with the topic of this thread, I had always considered Slackware to be the best. IMO, Arch builds upon the qualities of Slackware, so Arch > Slackware, which obviously implies that Slackware isn't the best; but, I think one could say 0 < (Arch - Slackware) <= x, for some small value of x (i.e. Arch is better, but not by a huge margin). Not trying to start a flame here. Just stating an opinion.

Last edited by infiniteh (2010-08-14 06:51:41)

Diablos · 2010-08-17 05:02:29

arch completes me. <3 ... lol.

stack_overflow · 2010-08-27 16:13:44

Arch is and will always be the best :-)

valium97582 · 2010-08-30 20:37:36

Arch rulez! But Fedora always manage to move me away from Arch for one week or two after new releases...

archman-cro · 2010-08-30 20:51:12

archman: "Arch is the best."
god: "You will find something better in a few months."
archman: "No."
god: "..."

varaahan · 2010-09-02 01:30:23

Yes ! definitely Arch is the best. But not for the newbies ! Even experienced users who have not had a hand at editing configuration files for quite some time may find it difficult ! (at least for me with over 8 years experience in linux ). Due to my distro hopping habbit , when I installed Arch after quite some time I forgot everything and I had to re-invent the wheel. Of course that is a problem for an individual like me and not for the mass. Yet Arch is one of the cleanest , simplest and blazingly fast distros one could ever find.

Encho · 2010-09-12 17:16:29

Hope I won't annoy anyone. I am (new in linux and have never used forums) lost. I use linux Arch and I have problem with my dvdrom - when I insert an empty dvd it's does not react ? how can I fix that?
Thanks.

Last edited by Encho (2010-09-12 17:17:26)

.:B:. · 2010-09-12 18:01:05

This really isn't the place to ask that kind of question. There is a Newbie corner; it's all yours - make use of it.

snyda · 2010-09-29 17:50:08

Definitely the absolute best distro I've used by a mile.

jwhendy · 2010-10-05 03:31:16

=== Preamble ===
Sorry for a weird post, but I just had to do it. I've distro-bounced for the last probably 4 years now and finally settled on Arch by accident. I stated with [of course] Ubuntu just to try things out and then researched and researched and researched and settled on Zenwalk which I still think is the bomb. Then I got antsy again and looked at some others like Wolvix, straight Slackware, Salix OS when it came out via ex-Zenwalk developers, CrunchBang... who knows what else. I have the pile of CDs to show for it all.
In any case, I went for Arch because I needed a 64bit distro for work. I actually looked at Arch once before a couple years ago but made the mistake of thinking it was a source-based/focused distro (I now know it can be but does not need to be) and thus once I saw the install screen and mirror setup and a bunch of other crap I got panic-attacks and flashbacks from my stint with FreeBSD. Yes, that was a quasi-fun time and I *finally* got FreeBSD booting on a MacBook and felt amazing but realized that compiling all through the freaking day was sucky and the hardware support was really bad as well.

=== Meat ===
Ok, enough back story. Fast forward and I've been using Arch for perhaps 6 months now. I started this thread to remind everyone who takes it for granted that it is AMAZING. I cannot freaking believe the packages I find out about somewhere and then find in the AUR. I can't remember the last time (if ever) I didn't find what I wanted. Texlive-Localmanager makes things seamless for emacs work and keeping track of things in pacman/yaourt. Netpkg in Zenwalk was great, but I really missed the ability to find *true* orphans like with portmaster in FreeBSD. Arch can!
What brought this about? I was curious about how one might make a "live" version of their distro in a kind of "generic" way because I wanted to use something like "Arch Live" and didn't know if it existed. I want a live distro on CD or USB but love Arch and want to make it custom and not have to be stuck with some other distro's live version. So... I googled "how to make a live version of your distro" and was not satisfied.
For the sh*t of it I googled "arch linux live" and right there was a link to the Arch Wiki about making a live version of Arch. "Fu*#ing-A that's awesome," I exclaimed, completely alone in my kitchen and then decided to make this post. What in the world *doesn't* Arch have documented for the user?? Seriously, what an amazing distro and what a shame it took me so long to find it! It's literally got everything a geek like me wants: don't do what I don't tell you to do (because I want to feel like a power user), superb documentation (for all the times I realize I'm not actually a power user), an amazing forum, packages out the butt, and the best system for managing packages I've seen to-date (though to be fair I only know netpkg, variants of [g][sl]apt[-get], and brief encounters with openSuSe). Linux heaven.

=== Takeaway ===
Keep making Arch better! I try to give back. I update the wiki when I find broken links and just added a bunch of crap to the section on getting the Canon iP4300 printer to work. I could have just taken from the wiki, filled in some missing pieces, and dealt with the broken links... but I tried to document it for 2 reasons: 1) selfishness: next time I reinstall and have to do this, I'll remember those little tricks I figured out the last time! 2) Arch is awesome and one should contribute where possible!
Okay. Enough of a rant. I hope this helps the community to re-remember how sweet Arch really is!

amanadriano · 2010-10-09 17:04:00

i've just installed last week. best distro i ever tried. will be using for my work. thanks a lot. : )

hyperflexed · 2010-10-19 21:33:53

Arch fills in my heart what once was a dark and lonely place.

Arch is too zen. It hurts.

No need to deal with millions of entries in millions of files. rc.conf FTW. I'm considering adding ``alias rc-it-up="vim /etc/rc.conf"`` to my .bash_aliases file.

k_ibou · 2010-10-20 01:58:30

I must join to this...

Definitely Arch is the best GNU/Linux distro. Before Arch I was using ubuntu and it took me some time to change but.... that was one of the best things that I could do for me and my PC lol

btw I learned a lot, and still learning since that.... about a year and a half!!!!!!

Devs.... Thanks for this distro. It really make us happy

Arch Linux

#476 2010-07-28 20:03:41

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#477 2010-08-02 12:41:57

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#478 2010-08-03 08:14:41

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#479 2010-08-03 09:47:28

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#480 2010-08-06 09:11:52

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#481 2010-08-06 13:21:06

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#482 2010-08-07 21:38:17

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#483 2010-08-07 22:31:27

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#484 2010-08-08 18:13:40

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#485 2010-08-09 01:24:14

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#486 2010-08-09 08:10:01

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#487 2010-08-13 14:29:24

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#488 2010-08-14 05:51:13

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#489 2010-08-17 05:02:29

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#490 2010-08-27 16:13:44

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#491 2010-08-30 20:37:36

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#492 2010-08-30 20:51:12

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#493 2010-09-02 01:30:23

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#494 2010-09-12 17:16:29

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#495 2010-09-12 18:01:05

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#496 2010-09-29 17:50:08

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#497 2010-10-05 03:31:16

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#498 2010-10-09 17:04:00

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#499 2010-10-19 21:33:53

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

#500 2010-10-20 01:58:30

Re: The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread

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