Trying out Arch Linux

[Lino]

After breaking Ubuntu and Mint Linux for the last time yesterday! I am itching to start trying a more advanced distro. I have decided on Arch Linux! Any advice?

 

[adrianx]

I installed Arch a couple of weeks ago and I really like it. I would have been lost without the documentation, though.
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Official_Arch_Linux_Install_Guide
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginners'_Guide

RTFM and "Google is your friend" really apply to Arch, imo.

 

[ponder]

Any advice?

http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginners'_Guide

The above guide is usually enough to get you up and running, read it and follow the steps

 

[s0lar]

You cant go wrong with Arch, I love it. My only complaint is the pacman mirrors are a bit slow. Pacman doest seem to handle package revisions to well, so don't swop mirrors unnecessarily.

 

[Tinuva]

I have a suggestion.

When you do try Arch, its quite a bit of work to figure out AUR and how to build packages manually, although its not a bad thing there is an easier way. Install Yaourt which is an extension to pacman, but includes the AUR and automatic building of the packages for you. It can also update those package automatically for you when they are updated by the community.

The easiest way to get it, is to add the repo to /etc/pacman.conf with this for 64bit:

[archlinuxfr]
Server = http://repo.archlinux.fr/x86_64

I assume its as easy for 32bit by replacing x86_64 with i686

 

[Lino]

Thanks for the advice everyone, will start on it tonight

 

[Alastairo]

You cant go wrong with Arch, I love it. My only complaint is the pacman mirrors are a bit slow. Pacman doest seem to handle package revisions to well, so don't swop mirrors unnecessarily.

There is a local mirror :http://archlinux.mirror.ac.za/

 

[MyWorld]

Arch is easy and I like the fact that they handle packages and dependencies quite a bit better than Gentoo.

I only had one issue so far and that was with libjpeg on the [testing] arch.

TIP 1: If you are going to run [testing] then you MUST subscribe to the arch-dev mailing list (+/- 30 emails a day - you can choose the option to "bundle" them then you receive about 3 emails with all the mailing list replies for the day). http://mailman.archlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/arch-dev-public

TIP 2: If you are going to use AUR (which you probably will) make sure to know and keep up to date on what you installed. Sometimes you will need a temp lib fix or something similar and you normally get this on AUR, just remember to remove the temp fix/whatever once your issue has been resolved through the official pacman repository.
While libjpeg-7 was rebuilding all the packages that was dependant on it I had to use a temp libjpeg-6 fix to have a working desktop. Once libjpeg-7 was done rebuilding all the software (which took about 2-3 weeks) I had no need for the libjpeg-6 fix so removed it. If you cannot remember what you did where you are going to burn your fingers sooner or later.

TIP 3: Work through the WIKI. There are a lot of things that you will never know about Arch if you do not read up on it. Same as with Gentoo, the WIKI is gold!

 

[ponder]

I only had one issue so far and that was with libjpeg on the [testing] arch.

Why do you run testing? The core repo is up to date enough for me.

 

[Lino]

Thank you all for your advice, I decided to first play around with it in a virtual environment (Virtual Box) if I get that right then I'll install it on my one PC first.

So far I have installed the base system, and installing python via pacman.

 

[MyWorld]

Why do you run testing? The core repo is up to date enough for me.

Because I like having the latest and greatest, some software are only available on testing and in AUR.

 

[Lino]

Making progress with this distro managed to update the system via pacman. This evening I plan to setup alsa, x11 and gnome

 

[hawker]

I'm keen to try arch soon as well!

 

[Lino]

Oh good grief! The repo's are a pain, files missing and this is with trying various ones. Am I supposed to have more than one at a time? I tried adding the http://archlinux.mirror.ac.za/ I couldn't get it to work either.

 

[ponder]

Linoman, use the main mirror ftp.archlinux.org

Alternatively I use www.mirrorservice.org

They are both in yourmirrorlist file, just uncomment them.

 

[Other Pineapple Smurf]

Tried Arch on my Netbook over the weekend and its base install is amazing

Going to also try Gnome install this evening. Many Aspire One users give rave revues on Arch. I only use my Netbook to SSH and access the Web in an emergency.

 

[Lino]

Did you have any problems with Pacman repo's?

So far I just ran into trouble once I started trying to install X11, now having changed repo's again I am having such issues.

Tried Arch on my Netbook over the weekend and its base install is amazing

Going to also try Gnome install this evening. Many Aspire One users give rave revues on Arch. I only use my Netbook to SSH and access the Web in an emergency.

 

[adrianx]

Did you have any problems with Pacman repo's?

So far I just ran into trouble once I started trying to install X11, now having changed repo's again I am having such issues.

I'm not in Arch at the moment, but if I remember correctly, you should run "pacman -Syy" after changing mirrors.

 

[Lino]

I'm not in Arch at the moment, but if I remember correctly, you should run "pacman -Syy" after changing mirrors.

I did, it seems I some how stuffed up my /etc/pacman.conf I think I need to find someone elses.

 

[adrianx]

Here's mine:

#
# /etc/pacman.conf
#
# See the pacman.conf(5) manpage for option and repository directives

#
# GENERAL OPTIONS
#
[options]
# The following paths are commented out with their default values listed.
# If you wish to use different paths, uncomment and update the paths.
#RootDir     = /
#DBPath      = /var/lib/pacman/
#CacheDir    = /var/cache/pacman/pkg/
#LogFile     = /var/log/pacman.log
HoldPkg     = pacman glibc
# If upgrades are available for these packages they will be asked for first
SyncFirst   = pacman
#XferCommand = /usr/bin/wget --passive-ftp -c -O %o %u
#XferCommand = /usr/bin/curl %u > %o
#CleanMethod = KeepInstalled

# Pacman won't upgrade packages listed in IgnorePkg and members of IgnoreGroup
#IgnorePkg   =
#IgnoreGroup =

#NoUpgrade   =
#NoExtract   =

# Misc options (all disabled by default)
#UseSyslog
#ShowSize
#UseDelta
#TotalDownload

#
# REPOSITORIES
#   - can be defined here or included from another file
#   - pacman will search repositories in the order defined here
#   - local/custom mirrors can be added here or in separate files
#   - repositories listed first will take precedence when packages
#     have identical names, regardless of version number
#   - URLs will have $repo replaced by the name of the current repo
#
# Repository entries are of the format:
#       [repo-name]
#       Server = ServerName
#       Include = IncludePath
#
# The header [repo-name] is crucial - it must be present and
# uncommented to enable the repo.
#

# The testing repositories are disabled by default. To enable, uncomment the
# repo name header and Include lines. You can add preferred servers immediately
# after the header, and they will be used before the default mirrors.

#[testing]
## Add your preferred servers here, they will be used first
#Include = /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

[core]
# Add your preferred servers here, they will be used first
Include = /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

[extra]
# Add your preferred servers here, they will be used first
Include = /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

#[community-testing]
## Add your preferred servers here, they will be used first
#Include = /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

[community]
# Add your preferred servers here, they will be used first
Include = /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

# An example of a custom package repository.  See the pacman manpage for
# tips on creating your own repositories.
#[custom]
#Server = file:///home/custompkgs

* I'm not sure about HoldPkg = pacman glibc though.

Edit: HoldPkg is a good thing -
If a user tries to --remove a package that’s listed in HoldPkg, pacman will ask for confirmation before proceeding.