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Arch Linux

Mattymatt

Mattymatt

Imperfectly Perfect
Despite a rather severe case of situational depression, I managed a big learning step today. I got Arch Linux installed and configured as a Virtual Box guest on my Windows 10 desktop. This was a fairly big feat for me because my concentration wasn't there but the determination was. As I dug deeper into doing a very low-level install, I found it fascinating and even a lot of fun. Arch doesn't really have an installer, you just boot with a live CD, set-up the environment, install the packages, reboot, and go to town. In fact, I am typing this message on my new Arch install. I had tried several others and had complaints about the documentation or the fact that everything was hidden behind a GUI. My entire goal was to learn more about how systemd and Linux works and I think I made some awesome headway. Not bad for a set-in-his-ways OpenBSD guy. In fact, Arch has some OpenBSD-like qualities which I've found good. Certainly, the documentation for Arch is much better than some of the others like Debian. Eeek, Debian is a dumpster fire.
 
Good Job! I tried to install Arch Linux in a VM myself some time ago but couldn't wrap my head around it even when using a Installation guide
 
Isadoorian said:
Good Job! I tried to install Arch Linux in a VM myself some time ago but couldn't wrap my head around it even when using a Installation guide
Click to expand...
Thank you! I leaned heavily on the Arch Wiki and YouTube videos. It definitely wasn't easy and it's taken some getting used to but the OS is growing on me.
 
The Arch Wiki have been quite valuable for me even if I use other distributions.
I tried installing Artix one time but got stuck with disks that refused to partition.

The Arch Wiki Installation guide do not look to difficult, It looks like the same difficulty as the Gentoo Handbook.
I might take another crack at it.
 
@Crozix Go for it! Wish you the best. The more I am diving into Arch, the more I like it. I am even finding systemd not so intolerable after all. My only realt stumbling block that took intense googling was figuring out how to get networking going. As it turned out, there were two fantastic videos on how to get it going with NetworkManager and systemd-networkd/systemd-resolved. I opted for NetworkManager because it looked a whole lot less painless. I think if this was going to be a server though, I would've used systemd.
 
Crozix said:
The Arch Wiki have been quite valuable for me even if I use other distributions.
I tried installing Artix one time but got stuck with disks that refused to partition.

The Arch Wiki Installation guide do not look to difficult, It looks like the same difficulty as the Gentoo Handbook.
I might take another crack at it.
Click to expand...
I forgot about Gentoo live, but now I'm wondering if the original installation has changed, because originally - it could not even begin to be compared to an Arch installation, or any others. The entire installation was command line, manual configuration, right down to x.org drivers. Did they finally give in to pressure to simplify it?

Mattymatt said:
@Crozix Go for it! Wish you the best. The more I am diving into Arch, the more I like it. I am even finding systemd not so intolerable after all. My only realt stumbling block that took intense googling was figuring out how to get networking going. As it turned out, there were two fantastic videos on how to get it going with NetworkManager and systemd-networkd/systemd-resolved. I opted for NetworkManager because it looked a whole lot less painless. I think if this was going to be a server though, I would've used systemd.
Click to expand...
NetworkManager HAS made networking a lot less painful and more universal across desktop Linux installations.

What desktop environment did you choose?
 
rollerskate said:
I forgot about Gentoo live, but now I'm wondering if the original installation has changed, because originally - it could not even begin to be compared to an Arch installation, or any others. The entire installation was command line, manual configuration, right down to x.org drivers. Did they finally give in to pressure to simplify it?
Click to expand...

It seems to have been simplified, but almost all operating systems seems to have been simplified over the years.
I just learned Gentoo a few years ago by just following the handbook and getting a broken but working system.
 
rollerskate said:
I forgot about Gentoo live, but now I'm wondering if the original installation has changed, because originally - it could not even begin to be compared to an Arch installation, or any others. The entire installation was command line, manual configuration, right down to x.org drivers. Did they finally give in to pressure to simplify it?


NetworkManager HAS made networking a lot less painful and more universal across desktop Linux installations.

What desktop environment did you choose?
Click to expand...
I really like MATE. I run MATE on my Lenovo ThinkPad T420 which runs OpenBSD 6.4. I found XFCE to be a little too light weight for me. MATE is the perfect setup for me. It stays out of my way just enough for me to get things done without being a PITA.
 
I have a cloud VPN server which I use to secure my connections. That cloud server is OpenBSD 6.4 running OpenVPN.
 
There are a lot of low level customization and optimizing you can do in arch that are much more difficult than the install.
For me, the much harder part is getting my optimus (nvidia intel hybrid gpu) laptop to work properly.
Arch Linux is the default distro for me if I want to set up my desktop for long term use.
 
Regarding my Optimus laptop, here is a rant:
Turns out it is possible to not only do hybrid gpu for me, but also IOMMU, passing through pci devices into virtual machines.
That way it is possible for me to switch on a windows vm inside linux with near native gaming perfomance, and other things - in theory.
What went wrong? After 2 days of trying to get it to work, I get error 43 from the nvidia driver inside the working VM
Sounds like it wouldn't work anyway, what's wrong about that? The community made bad nvidia drivers have no issues with that
 
I use Mint myself, it's Ubuntu based. Very nice, and the programmer team is foreign so they do things with it that American coders can't. The laptops and desktops sold today actually don't have hard drives, the OS-Windows 10-is apparently firmware burned into ROM chips on the motherboard and you can't get rid of it. Thankfully there are still plenty of older laptops/desktops out there that have actual hard drives that you can wipe and install.
 
oregano said:
OS-Windows 10-is apparently firmware burned into ROM chips on the motherboard and you can't get rid of it.
Click to expand...
What? I know there is a lot of crap stuffed in computer hardware nowadays, but about things that are actual windows stuff I only know about the OEM license key.
 
I know that on my Lenovo ThinkCentre m710t, the Windows 10 key is burned into the ROM but that doesn't effect installing other operating systems. Unless you are using an operating system that has security keys signed by Microsoft, you have to disable SecureBoot. I had to do this in order to get Arch Linux working.
 
Nvidia has always been a pain in the butt for Linux. Linus actually gave them the finger at a conference and told them f you! Lol

I stick with ATI. May not have the best drivers in the world, but at least it works well out of the box. I don't do any gaming, just vm, graphics, and video, and it works well for that purpose.

ATI open sources their drivers. Nvidia does not. That's part of what makes Nvidia such a pain for Linux users.
 
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