Tried Arch

[Pasdar]

Or rather, I had a taste of Arch. hehe...

Installed the base system etc, etc... everything straightforward, went fast... didn't even look at the beginners guide... so I thought, if everything continues like this i'll have this system up and running pretty quickly... but i was wrong, lol... so the base system was installed, there I was with my black screen...

I knew I had to use pacman to install everything I needed, but didn't know what to install out of the top of my head. So I opened up the beginners guide... so anyway, right after I did pacman -S xorg... I checked how much I still had to go on the guide... and then I thought, "F that ... i'm not gonna go through all that"... lol

Lesson: Its seems that the older you get (not everyone of course), the less you feel like putting lots of time in such things.

So that's all the taste I had of Arch... ):P

*Currently downloading Chakra project to check that*

[ZankerH]

TL;DR:

"I can't be bothered to follow a linear and straightforward tutorial that consists of typing ~20 command lines into the terminal."

There, was that so hard?

Use what you like, but this really isn't a post about Arch so much as it is about your not being bothered to try it properly.

[RiceMonster]

This is sort of the reason I only use it on one of my computers. On my laptop I didn't want to manage rolling updates and set everything up myself. Managing that on one computer is enough.


TL;DR:

"I can't be bothered to follow a linear and straightforward tutorial that consists of typing ~20 commands lines into the terminal."

There, was that so hard?

The OP wasn't interested in setting up the system manually (rather than having it already set up). I don't think it's a case of finding it hard, just rather not being interested. What's wrong with that?

[ZankerH]

What's wrong with that?

The fact that the tone of his post basically implies it is, in fact, too hard.

EDIT: Also, Chakra is in early alpha. You're better off just installing Arch and KDEmod - which is basically what chakra is.

[koleoptero]

Lesson: Its seems that the older you get (not everyone of course), the less you feel like putting lots of time in such things.
Yeah I know what you're talking about. It's exactly what happened with me.

TL;DR:

"I can't be bothered to follow a linear and straightforward tutorial that consists of typing ~20 command lines into the terminal."

There, was that so hard?

Use what you like, but this really isn't a post about Arch so much as it is about your not being bothered to try it properly.
It is a post about arch, whether you arch fanboy like it or not.
/fuel

[LowSky]

Arch setup is really straight forward.

Too bad you didn't give it a shot.

[Skripka]

Or rather, I had a taste of Arch. hehe...

Installed the base system etc, etc... everything straightforward, went fast... didn't even look at the beginners guide... so I thought, if everything continues like this i'll have this system up and running pretty quickly... but i was wrong, lol... so the base system was installed, there I was with my black screen...

I knew I had to use pacman to install everything I needed, but didn't know what to install out of the top of my head. So I opened up the beginners guide... so anyway, right after I did pacman -S xorg... I checked how much I still had to go on the guide... and then I thought, "F that ... i'm not gonna go through all that"... lol

Lesson: Its seems that the older you get (not everyone of course), the less you feel like putting lots of time in such things.

So that's all the taste I had of Arch... ):P

*Currently downloading Chakra project to check that*

Yea. Please read the Beginner's Guide before and during install. Your skipping it was the foundation of your problems/annoyances/frustration.

[Xbehave]

Arch setup is really straight forward.

Too bad you didn't give it a shot.
Not as straight forward as ubuntu/fedora/debian though. It is, much more straight forward than gentoo/lfs, everything is relative.

Arch is a good distro just stop pretending it's new user friendly.

*passes koleoptero another can

[SomeGuyDude]

Hey, genius. Chakra is just Arch with a graphical installer. It might make it a touch easier to setup, but you're going to be completely hosed when it comes to doing anything after that.

Arch isn't for everyone, and if you're too dang lazy to read a whopping 10 pages or so then just move on and install something different. Chakra will get you set up faster but good luck if you run into a broken package or need to install CUPS or something that requires playing with your rc.conf file.

It really does baffle me that people will watch a Dr Who marathon but think taking an hour to read a guide to setting up their computer is just too much time.

[Skripka]

Not as straight forward as ubuntu/fedora/debian though. It is, much more straight forward than gentoo/lfs, everything is relative.

Arch is a good distro just stop pretending it's new user friendly.


He wasn't

Installing Arch is usually about as hard as making Mac & Cheese...it is relatively straightforward, if you read the cooking instructions.

Getting annoyed and frustrated at Kraft (who made your Mac & Cheese in a box), and calling Mac & Cheese too difficult to make- because you chose not to follow the directions printed on the box...is well...

[koleoptero]

He wasn't

Installing Arch is usually about as hard as making Mac & Cheese...it is relatively straightforward, if you read the cooking instructions.

Getting annoyed and frustrated at Kraft (who made your Mac & Cheese in a box), and calling Mac & Cheese too difficult to make- because you chose not to follow the directions printed on the box...is well...
Don't blame us for preferring ready-made mac&cheese that we only have to warm up in a microwave oven though.

[Skripka]

Don't blame us for preferring ready-made mac&cheese that we only have to warm up in a microwave oven though.

Where did anyone blame anyone?

[SomeGuyDude]

Not as straight forward as ubuntu/fedora/debian though. It is, much more straight forward than gentoo/lfs, everything is relative.

Arch is a good distro just stop pretending it's new user friendly.

*passes koleoptero another can

It IS straightforward. If you READ THE GUIDE. The Beginners Guide will take you step... by... step through the installation. If you actually sit there with the guide and read every step of the process, there is NOTHING that will surprise you.

[Paqman]

It IS straightforward. If you READ THE GUIDE. The Beginners Guide will take you step... by... step through the installation. If you actually sit there with the guide and read every step of the process, there is NOTHING that will surprise you.

If it's that straightforward, surely much of it could be automated?

[ZankerH]

Don't blame us for preferring ready-made mac&cheese that we only have to warm up in a microwave oven though.

Nobody is blaming you. It's just that I'm tired of posts that point out the obvious - you need to understand GNU/Linux and read the documentation in order to "get" Arch - by people who don't.

[Excedio]

I have a bad feeling about this thread...

[koleoptero]

If it's that straightforward, surely much of it could be automated?
They're already proud of their excellent wiki (which it is btw), they don't need to automate it too.

[bigbrovar]

I totally enjoyed my arch experience. Most Ubuntu user is not going to be attracted to arch because for them its about a system that just works. They don't want to know what makes it works and why it works. Arch on the other hand was a learning experience for me. The installation is not as brain dead as ubuntu. If you are a new user ( new to arch not new to linux) you have to start with the beginners guide which is one of the best piece of documentation i have ever seen on Linux. It doesn't just tell you what to do. it also tells you the why, so you are making an informed decision and you know why you and what makes your system works. hence it puts you in a better position to manage it in case things break. I wrote a post about it a while back http://bigbrovar.aoizora.org/?p=576 In all i learnt more about Linux installing and using arch, than i did using in almost 2 years of using ubuntu

[snowpine]

If it's that straightforward, surely much of it could be automated?

Yes, it easily could be automated, but there is a reason it is not:


Hiding the process of system configuration is in direct opposition to The Arch Way. While it is true that recent versions of the kernel and hardware probing tools offer excellent hardware support and auto-configuration, Arch presents the user all pertinent configuration files during installation for the purposes of transparency and system resource control. By the time you have finished modifying these files to your specifications, you will have learned the simple method of manual Arch Linux system configuration and become more familiar with the base structure, leaving you better prepared to use and maintain your new installation productively.

http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginners%27_Guide

Ubuntu is well automated and usually "just works" for most users... but look at all the recent "Help! Such and such is broken in Karmic!!!" threads on these forums. Many Ubuntu users do not know how to troubleshoot simple problems because they are accustomed to everything being automated, and don't understand the underlying system.

You can spend a couple of relaxed hours with a cup of coffee and the Arch Beginner's Guide, or you can spend a couple of frantic hours running around like a chicken with its head cut off because the Karmic upgrade breaks your system. My point is, sooner or later you'll have to spend some small amount of time learning how Linux works, might as well "front load" that learning process into the original install process, at a time that is convenient for you, rather than waiting until something breaks unexpectedly.

[chris200x9]

hey watch this:

1.
# adduser

2.
# pacman -Syu

3.
# pacman -S xorg alsa-utils fluxbox nvidia xf86-input-synaptics xf86-input-keyboard

4.
# nano /etc/rc.conf add "hal" to daemon string

5.
# alsaconf

6.
# visudo

7. reboot

8. login as user

9.
$ nano ~/.xinitrc add exec fluxbox

10. startx


ten steps, full X full sound :P

[LowSky]

If it's that straightforward, surely much of it could be automated?

The idea of Arch is KISS, Keep it Simple and Stupid.
Its why an Arch Install CD is only 200MB and not 700MB.
Making things automatic means you need much more disk-space, automated means less choice because the developer is picking for you, automated means you never gain the knowledge of command line, which can save your behind if the GUI fails.

[JohnFH]

I tried Arch and can appreciate what it takes, ie. not simple but not difficult either. Some people just don't want to have to manually enter that many commands and they don't want to try to understand them and you know what? That's absolutely fine!

I'm a software developer by trade and write code for a living (currently C# mainly), so when I go home at night I don't want to write even more code to get my own computer to work properly. I don't use Arch for that reason. I have 5 machines at home all happily running Ubuntu and working fine. Arch-lovers need to learn that it's ok for people not to use Arch after trying it.

[Paqman]

The idea of Arch is KISS, Keep it Simple and Stupid.


I know, I was teasing.

I've read up on the Arch philosophy, and i'd have to say I don't really agree with it. In my opinion, automation is simplicity. Making the machine work harder to make my life easier is a Good Thing™, after all that's what they were invented for.

However, I can see that a certain subset of users like a pared-back, hands-on system, so Arch must be just the ticket for them.

[ZankerH]

I know, I was teasing.

I've read up on the Arch philosophy, and i'd have to say I don't really agree with it. In my opinion, automation is simplicity. Making the machine work harder to make my life easier is a Good Thing™, after all that's what they were invented for.

However, I can see that a certain subset of users like a pared-back, hands-on system, so Arch must be just the ticket for them.

Hiding choices from the user, and the developer making choices the user should make, does not make anyone's life easier.

[Xbehave]

Hiding choices from the user, and the developer making choices the user should make, does not make anyone's life easier.
It makes the users life easier, especially when the developer gets the choice right.

Would you drop udev and go back to a static file where you define your hardware? I mean the user should know what his hardware is right?

This is a philosophical argument (aka pointless), but pretending that YOU are right is ridcious, i agree with paqman

I've read up on the Arch philosophy, and i'd have to say I don't really agree with it. In my opinion, automation is simplicity.

[Paqman]

Hiding choices from the user, and the developer making choices the user should make, does not make anyone's life easier.

That's a generalisation, and as such will be right in some cases and wrong in others.

Streamlining a workflow (such as installing an OS), should IMO involve making some sensible decisions about what decisions actually need to be made by the user, how to help the user make the correct decision, and what is best automated. After all, even in the Arch install, the vast majority of the process is in fact automated. Just compare it to the LFS install to see that ;)

No one distro can be all things to all people. After all, Arch's approach is in it's own way very restrictive, as it excludes a large proportion of potential users from even being able to get it installed. That's a design decision the Arch devs have made, but they shouldn't pretend that their particular design philosophy is better a priori, which is the disturbing impression their documentation (and sadly many of the users) seems to give.

I'm not knocking Arch, a lot of folks love it, so it's obviously doing things that people want, and doing them well. I just think it's clearly aiming to be a niche distro catering only to a certain flavour of geek.

[earthpigg]

i regard arch as the ultimate fallback distro.

in the end, it is nearly guaranteed that arch will support whatever you are trying to do. or, at the very least, it will be the first to support it.

whatever it is that you are trying:

do cost-benefit analysis: time spent trying, configuring, and testing various distros VS installing and configuring arch once.

the more obscure or weird or unconventional your task is, the more likely arch will win the above CBA.

in my case, the CBA that came about after i learned that ubuntu 9.04 did not very well support my i7 motherboard resulted in an arch install.

[MisfitI38]

After all, Arch's approach is in it's own way very restrictive, as it excludes a large proportion of potential users from even being able to get it installed. That's a design decision the Arch devs have made, but they shouldn't pretend that their particular design philosophy is better a priori, which is the disturbing impression their documentation (and sadly many of the users) seems to give.

I am curious. Where in the Arch documentation have you gleaned that impression?

[earthpigg]

I am curious. Where in the Arch documentation have you gleaned that impression?

http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Arch_vs_Others#Arch_vs_Ubuntu


If you want to get up and running quickly and not fiddle around with the guts of the system as much, Ubuntu is better suited...

...The Arch community is much smaller and is strongly encouraged to be proactive; a large percentage contribute to the distro. In contrast, the Ubuntu community is quite large and can therefore tolerate a much larger percentage of users who do not contribute to development, package or repo maintenance.

if the reader chooses to be cynical, that could be read as:

if you aint got time on your hands, GTFO.
thus excluding people that work 70 hours/week and/or have a family and/or dogs and/or a lot of high maintenance fish.

i didn't interpret it like that myself, but i can see how there is potential that some would.

[1111peoy]

Haha! so true! At this date I dont use any kind of linux distro. Im using windows xp 100% of my time. But I love to talk about linux stuff and such things :p

The real reason why I dont use a linux distro is that I dont see why I need it :P

[gn2]

I had a taste of Arch.

Yuk, mouthwash should fix that.

[cariboo]

Haha! so true! At this date I dont use any kind of linux distro. Im using windows xp 100% of my time. But I love to talk about linux stuff and such things :p

The real reason why I dont use a linux distro is that I dont see why I need it :P

Shouldn't you at least use it so you know what you are talking about?

[RiceMonster]

Yuk, mouthwash should fix that.

I was wondering when you'd show up.

[earthpigg]

Haha! so true! At this date I dont use any kind of linux distro. Im using windows xp 100% of my time. But I love to talk about linux stuff and such things :p

The real reason why I dont use a linux distro is that I dont see why I need it :P

sooo everything you could possibly want to do on your computer, windows XP does adequately?

a lot of novel new things have come about in the decade or so since XP was released, you know.

[Simian Man]

Yuk, mouthwash should fix that.

Couldn't figure out how to install X either huh?

[earthpigg]

Couldn't figure out how to install X either huh?

RTFM!


(joking! part of me has always wanted to say that, lol, but can't bring myself to say it for real. an Arch thread seemed an appropriate place, though.)

[Pasdar]

Lotsa replies here. I didn't mean to flame, but since the ball is in my court now, i'll have to kick it back:

The installation requires WAY more than 20 commands to install this. The commands chriss posted will do jack $%^&*. I started following the guide from the following step: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginners'_Guide#Step_2:_Update.2C_Sync.2C_and_Upg rade_the_system_with_pacman

Everything before that step I did on my own. From that point alone you'll have to go through nearly 100 commands, not to mention configuring things and what not. Just go count if you feel like it.

I have another thing to say. I think having such a guide is absolute BS. I read many people actually follow it from beginning to the end... if so many people follow this from beginning to the end, why on earth wouldn't you then automate the stupid list of commands and get it over with in the first place? If its a question of choice, then you could instead make a script and ask people to comment # everything they don't want to have installed from the standard guide... tada... same result and you don't have to read through 25 pages on just getting a basic OS with GUI running.

If you read through my post, you'll see that I didn't say anything negative about the OS... I wouldn't even call it criticism, it was merely an experience that some think I should have kept to myself apparently...

[snowpine]

The commands chriss posted will do jack $%^&*.

???

'adduser' doesn't add a user?
'pacman -Syu' doesn't update the system?
'pacman -S xorg' doesn't install xorg?
'nano /etc/rc.conf' doesn't edit your rc.conf file?

Sorry but I just don't believe you.... maybe you should go back and re-do the part you skipped? Sounds like you maybe forgot something important when you assumed the first part was irrelevant and you could start halfway through. :)

[mivo]

If it's that straightforward, surely much of it could be automated?

Yes, it could be automated, but that would be like Ubuntu shipping with restricted codeces. :) Arch has a design philosphy, and it follows it consequently: the user makes decisions, not an installer that offers one size for everyone. The beauty of Arch is precisely that you tag along the setup and configure it based on your needs as you go along.

The Beginner's Guide makes all of this a cakewalk. Not only does it provide commands to use, but also discusses them and the various choices you have. Just following the guide will make you a more competent Linux user. Unless someone has hardware issues, I'm unclear how someone cannot setup a working, lean and fast Arch system without much hassle (unless reading a guide is too tedious -- perhaps someone can make a comic strip based on it?). It isn't harder than installing Ubuntu (if you use the guide).

The cited bit about Ubuntu is in no way conceited. The Arch community is small, and there is no company behind it that can afford paid developers. Thus the individual user's willingess to help (code, support, reporting bugs, etc.) is more important. Ubuntu's user base is large, there is money, and thus it makes a better distro for someone who "just" wants a complete system out of the box where few decisions need to be made and who doesn't want to contribute actively. That is fine, too. Many people are happier with only few choices and get overwhelmed if there are too many options. There are plenty of people that I would recommend Ubuntu to, and not Arch. (Well, actually, right now I wouldn't recommend Ubuntu, but probably SuSE or Mint.)

I use Arch because I love the rolling release model (saves time in the long run), the freedom it offers and the fantastic performance it it features on the boxes I use it on. I'm not an expert user, but I can read, use a search engine, go through the excellent wiki, make use of the forum. I like how much I learn by doing so. And no, I'm not a teen with too much time, nor a tween. I soon won't even be in my 30s anymore. Curiousity and interest in learning have nothing to do with age. :)

And I too wondered how long it would take until gn2 would troll the thread.

[snowpine]

YI'm unclear how someone cannot setup a working, lean and fast Arch system without much hassle (unless reading a guide is too tedious -- perhaps someone can make a comic strip based on it?).

Arch Beginners Guide: The Comic Strip is a brilliant idea!!:lolflag:

[gn2]

Couldn't figure out how to install X either huh?

Nope, I just followed the aforementioned idiot's guide, piece of cake.

[awakatanka]

I use Arch because I love the rolling release model (saves time in the long run), the freedom it offers and the fantastic performance it it features on the boxes I use it on. I'm not an expert user, but I can read, use a search engine, go through the excellent wiki, make use of the forum.


Used Chakra to install it, after that i tweaked it to my personal taste. The rolling release is a bless, sometimes with a update you need to tweak some little things but mostly everything works like it should. Never missed (k)ubuntu after i had install chakra and tweaked it and will never go back to (k)unbuntu. Rolling release for the win.

[earthpigg]

Lotsa replies here. I didn't mean to flame, but since the ball is in my court now, i'll have to kick it back:

*snip*


well, i guess Arch isn't for you then. nothing wrong with that.

best of luck with your other exploring of Free Software.

[chris200x9]

Lotsa replies here. I didn't mean to flame, but since the ball is in my court now, i'll have to kick it back:

The installation requires WAY more than 20 commands to install this. The commands chriss posted will do jack $%^&*.

hmmm...I could have sworn thats *all* I did to get arch up and running on my laptop...are you sure you installed right?

[Greg]

hmmm...I could have sworn thats *all* I did to get arch up and running on my laptop...are you sure you installed right?

You're right, you can pretty much get an Arch install set up like that...

At the OP: No, you didn't try Arch.

[handy]

Yes, it could be automated, but that would be like Ubuntu shipping with restricted codeces. :) Arch has a design philosphy, and it follows it consequently: the user makes decisions, not an installer that offers one size for everyone. The beauty of Arch is precisely that you tag along the setup and configure it based on your needs as you go along.

The Beginner's Guide makes all of this a cakewalk. Not only does it provide commands to use, but also discusses them and the various choices you have. Just following the guide will make you a more competent Linux user. Unless someone has hardware issues, I'm unclear how someone cannot setup a working, lean and fast Arch system without much hassle (unless reading a guide is too tedious -- perhaps someone can make a comic strip based on it?). It isn't harder than installing Ubuntu (if you use the guide).

The cited bit about Ubuntu is in no way conceited. The Arch community is small, and there is no company behind it that can afford paid developers. Thus the individual user's willingess to help (code, support, reporting bugs, etc.) is more important. Ubuntu's user base is large, there is money, and thus it makes a better distro for someone who "just" wants a complete system out of the box where few decisions need to be made and who doesn't want to contribute actively. That is fine, too. Many people are happier with only few choices and get overwhelmed if there are too many options. There are plenty of people that I would recommend Ubuntu to, and not Arch. (Well, actually, right now I wouldn't recommend Ubuntu, but probably SuSE or Mint.)

I use Arch because I love the rolling release model (saves time in the long run), the freedom it offers and the fantastic performance it it features on the boxes I use it on. I'm not an expert user, but I can read, use a search engine, go through the excellent wiki, make use of the forum. I like how much I learn by doing so. And no, I'm not a teen with too much time, nor a tween. I soon won't even be in my 30s anymore. Curiousity and interest in learning have nothing to do with age. :)

I of course agree completely.

I'm well into my 50s & have only been into Linux for 4 years, & Arch since March 2008. That same install is what I'm using now, & it is going like a charm. :)



And I too wondered how long it would take until gn2 would troll the thread.

He's easy to sort out, just put him on your ignore list like I did. :D ):P


Arch Beginners Guide: The Comic Strip is a brilliant idea!!:lolflag:

There are multiple movies on YouTube that go through the installation & other stuff relating to Arch:

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=how+to+install+arch+linux&search_type=&aq=0&oq=how+to+install+arch

[Muppeteer]

Personally, i don't see the point in using Linux if you're not willing to spend some time to learn how it works. The Arch installation isn't that hard anyway, and you'd thank yourself in the long run for sticking with it. From what i've read, Arch is childsplay compared to Gentoo (which is next on my list).

[1111peoy]

Shouldn't you at least use it so you know what you are talking about?

Sure. But I'm an old ubuntu user. Have been fixing distro problems for myself and my friends for as long I can remember. :p

[handy]

Sure. But I'm an old ubuntu user. Have been fixing distro problems for myself and my friends for as long I can remember. :p

You won't know how Arch is different until you install & use it for a while.

It is VERY different to Ubuntu.

[Edit:] & I thought my memory was bad... ;)

[1111peoy]

sooo everything you could possibly want to do on your computer, windows XP does adequately?

a lot of novel new things have come about in the decade or so since XP was released, you know.

Well, yes. I can play music, use photoshop, do some small programming, chat, browse and play games sometimes. But sure, sometimes I feel the urge for linux, but when that happends I just force myself to not install a distro because I will end up with windows again because I want to do this and that. But I love to talk and discuss linux stuff :p

[1111peoy]

You won't know how Arch is different until you install & use it for a while.

It is VERY different to Ubuntu.

[Edit:] & I thought my memory was bad... ;)

Sure its different, under the hood. But at the end it is running a linux kernel and the same apps, or maybe more etc. I know what I am talking about:P there are difference in all distros, but you will end up with the same "must have" apps like VLC. And sometimes I update myself on whats happening in the linux world, read changelogs etc. :p

[SuperSonic4]

Arch is quicker once it's set up. To update your system

Arch: Every now and again run

Follow the beginner's guide

sudo pacman -Syu


Kubuntu (to be fair any non rolling release distro):

Enable backports (still not a guarantee though)
every 6 months
Back up any important data
Download a 700mb ISO
Burn to CD
Install from a live cd - ensuring /home is not formatted
Try and update only to find servers are running too slowly

[SomeGuyDude]

I bought this car the other day, right? I didn't bother to read up on how to drive, and when I finally figured out how to make it move, the thing went straight into a telephone pole! Cars are clearly badly designed. Someone needs to make a car that's more straightforward!!

It was almost as bad as earlier this year when I bought a bottle of Robitussin, and I didn't read the instructions but I figured I should just drink some until I felt better, and I ended up in the ER!! What's going on with people? Why can't you make products that make sense?!?

[markp1989]

Or rather, I had a taste of Arch. hehe...

Installed the base system etc, etc... everything straightforward, went fast... didn't even look at the beginners guide... so I thought, if everything continues like this i'll have this system up and running pretty quickly... but i was wrong, lol... so the base system was installed, there I was with my black screen...

I knew I had to use pacman to install everything I needed, but didn't know what to install out of the top of my head. So I opened up the beginners guide... so anyway, right after I did pacman -S xorg... I checked how much I still had to go on the guide... and then I thought, "F that ... i'm not gonna go through all that"... lol

Lesson: Its seems that the older you get (not everyone of course), the less you feel like putting lots of time in such things.

So that's all the taste I had of Arch... ):P

*Currently downloading Chakra project to check that*

i did the same thing when i first tried arch,i gave it a go at a later date , and i liked it , so if you ever get bored give it a chance and see if you do like it.

[handy]

Sure its different, under the hood. But at the end it is running a linux kernel and the same apps, or maybe more etc. I know what I am talking about:P there are difference in all distros, but you will end up with the same "must have" apps like VLC. And sometimes I update myself on whats happening in the linux world, read changelogs etc. :p

Sorry old mate, you think you know what you are talking about.

Anyway, enjoy the ride. ;)

[Eisenwinter]

You do know that you're not forced to follow the begginers guide, right?


pacman -S xorg openbox pypanel
...download finished
Xorg -configure
edit ~/.xinitrc, add exec openbox-session

And there you go, a functionion system with a window manager.

[SomeGuyDude]

No, but not reading the guide is like buying a piano and then complaining that it doesn't make music when you punch the keys.

We really need to make a "Boo hoo I tried Arch but didn't follow the instructions and it didn't work right" megathread where BS like this can get put.

[dragos240]

Or rather, I had a taste of Arch. hehe...

Installed the base system etc, etc... everything straightforward, went fast... didn't even look at the beginners guide... so I thought, if everything continues like this i'll have this system up and running pretty quickly... but i was wrong, lol... so the base system was installed, there I was with my black screen...

I knew I had to use pacman to install everything I needed, but didn't know what to install out of the top of my head. So I opened up the beginners guide... so anyway, right after I did pacman -S xorg... I checked how much I still had to go on the guide... and then I thought, "F that ... i'm not gonna go through all that"... lol

Lesson: Its seems that the older you get (not everyone of course), the less you feel like putting lots of time in such things.

So that's all the taste I had of Arch... ):P

*Currently downloading Chakra project to check that*


It's easy. Once you get Xorg installed, just install your DE. That's it.

[mr-woof]

I'm also trying arch out at the moment in vmware, I've followed the beginners guide and installed the base system and then a couple of the desktop environments, it took a couple of goes to get it right.

I've settled on openbox for my desktop, I'm now trying to figure out how to get everything working on openbox :)

All good fun

Ps. Any openbox advice would be greatly appreciated lol

[SomeGuyDude]

Look at the Openbox guide on ArchWiki. My big tip? Install gmrun, obmenu, and obconf. That way you can have an Alt+F2 run dialog (or in my case, Super+Space), and you won't have to do all the configurations by hand.

[user1397]

Not trying to start a flame war or anything, but I have noticed a sort of 'eliteness' growing among arch users...it's like as if some people think it's not already geeky enough to use linux (like ubuntu)...they have to use the geekier linux aka arch :lolflag:

[SunnyRabbiera]

Hey, genius. Chakra is just Arch with a graphical installer. It might make it a touch easier to setup, but you're going to be completely hosed when it comes to doing anything after that.

Arch isn't for everyone, and if you're too dang lazy to read a whopping 10 pages or so then just move on and install something different. Chakra will get you set up faster but good luck if you run into a broken package or need to install CUPS or something that requires playing with your rc.conf file.

It really does baffle me that people will watch a Dr Who marathon but think taking an hour to read a guide to setting up their computer is just too much time.

Hey I like doctor who, anyhow as for chakra everything is worth a try.

[chucky chuckaluck]

end user here. i used arch for a year and just went back to it. it's pretty much like prefering a stick to an automatic. i'm under the impression that most people who've had trouble with arch are the ones who fancied themselves too cool to read the beginner's guide and way too cool to take some of the automated choices.

[SuperSonic4]

It's easy. Once you get Xorg installed, just install your DE. That's it.

Especially since they got input hotplugging sorted

[handy]

I'm also trying arch out at the moment in vmware, I've followed the beginners guide and installed the base system and then a couple of the desktop environments, it took a couple of goes to get it right.

I've settled on openbox for my desktop, I'm now trying to figure out how to get everything working on openbox :)

All good fun

Ps. Any openbox advice would be greatly appreciated lol

If you haven't already done so install "OBMenu", & "Openbox Configuration Manager", if pacman won't do it yaourt certainly will. If you haven't yet, make sure you get yaourt installed so you can very easily access all of the packages in the Arch User Repository (AUR).

You can use GTK(2) themes with Openbox, I really like the xfce4-panel & some of the plugins for it. Due to Xfce4 being so modular that stuff works beautifully with Openbox.

You will find excellent help in the Arch wiki on most of this stuff. :)

[handy]

Not trying to start a flame war or anything, but I have noticed a sort of 'eliteness' growing among arch users...it's like as if some people think it's not already geeky enough to use linux (like ubuntu)...they have to use the geekier linux aka arch :lolflag:

It's just your imagination.

The reason that there exist hundreds of Linux distros is because there are so many different ways that people like to do things.

What suits one, is another's poison.

There is no value judgements just the pure joy of having so many choices to play with, & to express our creativity through.

Enjoy. :D

[red_Marvin]

Not trying to start a flame war or anything, but I have noticed a sort of 'eliteness' growing among arch users...it's like as if some people think it's not already geeky enough to use linux (like ubuntu)...they have to use the geekier linux aka arch :lolflag:

Well, just as ubuntu does, arch has it's far share of trolls that think it's the pinncale of just about everything, that's life for you. However there are also those of us that simply like a minimalist distro. Ubuntu comes with a lot of things installed by default, and if that's what you want, you might stay. But if you want a lighter distro you'll have to uninstall a lot of things. So instead of installing ubuntu server and going from there I were curious and tried another distro altogether and liked what it had to offer. So I stayed.

So do I think arch is better? For me: yes. For everybody: wú.

[mr-woof]

Regarding all the distro's, do you think there is a path people take that end up with distro's like arch? Ie Ubuntu -> Something else -> Arch -> Gentoo etc?

[SuperSonic4]

Regarding all the distro's, do you think there is a path people take that end up with distro's like arch? Ie Ubuntu -> Something else -> Arch -> Gentoo etc?

Someone did make a topic about that actually - not too long ago either.

[mr-woof]

I demand proof :)

[SomeGuyDude]

Someone did make a topic about that actually - not too long ago either.

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1282132 ?

[SomeGuyDude]

Not trying to start a flame war or anything, but I have noticed a sort of 'eliteness' growing among arch users...it's like as if some people think it's not already geeky enough to use linux (like ubuntu)...they have to use the geekier linux aka arch :lolflag:

Or... I really love rolling release distros and Arch's AUR.

Y'know, whatever.

[Skripka]

Or... I really love rolling release distros and Arch's AUR.

Y'know, whatever.

Geek. :)

[mr-woof]

Reading the thread from someguydude, i'm scared now to be an ubuntu -> arch user :)

I might just have a go at Gentoo :)

[wojox]

Installing Arch is a great learning experience, for me any way. Being new to Gnu/Linux (seven months) I learned a lot from it. It makes Ubuntu that much easier.

[mr-woof]

I agree, I've learned a lot installing the test versions in vmware

[Skripka]

Reading the thread from someguydude, i'm scared now to be an ubuntu -> arch user :)

I might just have a go at Gentoo :)

See ya in a week in when you're done compiling. ):P

[mr-woof]

lol :D I'll post my vmware results soon

[RiceMonster]

Or... I really love rolling release distros and Arch's AUR.

Y'know, whatever.

Rolling release + pacman + AUR is why I use Arch.

[doorknob60]

He wasn't

Installing Arch is usually about as hard as making Mac & Cheese...it is relatively straightforward, if you read the cooking instructions.

Getting annoyed and frustrated at Kraft (who made your Mac & Cheese in a box), and calling Mac & Cheese too difficult to make- because you chose not to follow the directions printed on the box...is well...

Lol great analogy, I like it :) I agree, I can install Arch in about 10 minutes now now counting the time it takes to download packages, pretty sweet.

[SomeGuyDude]

Rolling release + pacman + AUR is why I use Arch.

A-yup. I'm definitely not a power user myself. I concede that Arch isn't the easiest distro (at least not for people who find it hard to "read directions"), but you definitely aren't going to be sitting there with terminals open unless you want to be.

[rb0171610]

I have completely switched over to Archlinux. The freedom!!! The install went well for me, but I am a previous Gentoo user. I like the Arch distro because it is extremely fast. There's a lot of choice about what to install.
Pacman is a much like apt-get, it did not take long for me to catch on.
What an amazing little distro if you are an advanced Linux user. I was beginning to feel trapped by all the screens and dialog in Ubuntu; I would enjoy all that if I was a Linux newbie or converting a Windows user.
I would encourage people to try it if they have a few hours on their hands and love Linux. I have had to tweak a few things here and there, but I must say the online documentation left the experiences rather painless.
What has been most important for me in the experience that was lacking in Ubuntu is control over my machine, the software and the configuration files. I understand Ubuntu is trying to bring Linux to the masses, which is great. But, if you are an advanced user with great command line skills and know your hardware and packages, then I would say Arch is a very enjoyable experience. It is fast and takes less time to manage than Gentoo.
I would also like to say that Gentoo is a good learning experience as well, and I recently tried it again. I had a lot of problems with masked packages and the documentation was no longer there, at least for me. I spent many hours compiling packages. Finally, I decided that it was not worth it. I remember Gentoo being a top notch distro several years back for advanced users, but I am not so sure that is true lately. I found a lot of bugs and package conflicts that I just could not or did not want to resolve by myself.
Ubuntu is a great distro if you are new to Linux. It provides a very safe learning environment and a usable desktop. Arch makes no assumptions about what you want installed. You have to install it all yourself. The great thing about it though is that most of the configuration you need to do is limited to a few files.
If you do not want to administrate, Arch is definitely not your distro. It is not for everyone, but neither is Ubuntu.

[handy]

Regarding all the distro's, do you think there is a path people take that end up with distro's like arch? Ie Ubuntu -> Something else -> Arch -> Gentoo etc?

MisfitI38, who is an Arch wiki & forum admin', stated here (pretty sure it was this forum) once, that back in the earlier days of Ubuntu, quite a number of Ubuntu users started migrating to Arch, it happened that at the same time the quality of the Arch wiki improved quite dramatically.

I think that, that is a very interesting observation.

[falconindy]

Gentoo should be lumped in with LFS and the other source based distros. They're the polar opposite from a distro like Ubuntu which almost discourages anything but binaries and provides a lot of functionality in the install package. I consider Arch to be a happy medium. It's based on binaries, but you have far more control over what goes on in your build. Honestly, I don't see what all the fuss is about managing a rolling release. If you know your way around a terminal and you're intelligent enough to keep your old packages, downgrading is just as easy as upgrading.

Yes, Arch has an amazing Wiki as a result of what I can only imagine is the combined efforts of dozens of users and the equivalent of several hundred man hours.

[rb0171610]

Gentoo should be lumped in with LFS and the other source based distros. They're the polar opposite from a distro like Ubuntu which almost discourages anything but binaries and provides a lot of functionality in the install package. I consider Arch to be a happy medium. It's based on binaries, but you have far more control over what goes on in your build. Honestly, I don't see what all the fuss is about managing a rolling release. If you know your way around a terminal and you're intelligent enough to keep your old packages, downgrading is just as easy as upgrading.

Yes, Arch has an amazing Wiki as a result of what I can only imagine is the combined efforts of dozens of users and the equivalent of several hundred man hours.
Yes downgrading is a cinch and well supported. If you want a different version of Firefox, go for it, etc.

[~sHyLoCk~]

I guess Arch is hated by users who failed installing/maintaining it. Sad thing though, you must always do a background research before doing something blindly. There are often posts in the Arch forums about "I just installed Arch..where is my desktop".."Arch gnome is so boring than ubuntu's" etc.. Arch = DIY. That's why it's different. Arch maintains a perfect balance from every aspect. A well-customizable system without the need to compile everything from source, and a nice package manager without making you install hundreds of packages as recursive dependencies. So next time you install/do something which you haven't done before, research/read about it yourself and don't just go blindly walking head-first coz everyone else is talking about it.

[handy]

Something that hasn't been mentioned is how easy it is to maintain Arch.

The rolling release package management & the fact that only what the installer chooses to install is installed has been mentioned multiple times I expect.

But the simplicity of the configuration files that are used really is worth mentioning & in this case I'll display them.

The primary file that needs to be used for the vast majority of system configuration, once Arch is installed, is /etc/rc.conf

__________________

#
# /etc/rc.conf - Main Configuration for Arch Linux
#

#
# -----------------------------------------------------------------------
# LOCALIZATION
# -----------------------------------------------------------------------
#
# LOCALE: available languages can be listed with the 'locale -a' command
# HARDWARECLOCK: set to "UTC" or "localtime"
# TIMEZONE: timezones are found in /usr/share/zoneinfo
# KEYMAP: keymaps are found in /usr/share/kbd/keymaps
# CONSOLEFONT: found in /usr/share/kbd/consolefonts (only needed for non-US)
# CONSOLEMAP: found in /usr/share/kbd/consoletrans
# USECOLOR: use ANSI color sequences in startup messages
#
LOCALE="en_AU.utf8"
HARDWARECLOCK="UTC"
TIMEZONE="Australia/Sydney"
KEYMAP="us"
CONSOLEFONT=
CONSOLEMAP=
USECOLOR="yes"

#
# -----------------------------------------------------------------------
# HARDWARE
# -----------------------------------------------------------------------
#
# Scan hardware and load required modules at bootup
MOD_AUTOLOAD="yes"
#
# ***** MODULE BLACKLIST IS NOW DEPRECATED **************************
# Module Blacklist - modules in this list will never be loaded by udev
# MOD_BLACKLIST=(net-pf-10 pcspkr) ## turns off ipv6 & pc speaker
# ************************************************** *****************
#
# Modules to load at boot-up (in this order)
# - prefix a module with a ! to blacklist it
#
MODULES=(!net-pf-10 !pcspkr sky2 snd-mixer-oss snd-pcm-oss snd-hwdep snd-page-alloc snd-pcm snd-timer snd snd-hda-intel soundcore radeon) ## fglrx
#
# You scan for LVM volume groups at startup, required if you use LVM
USELVM="no"

#
# -----------------------------------------------------------------------
# NETWORKING
# -----------------------------------------------------------------------
#
HOSTNAME="archtypical"
#
# Use 'ifconfig -a' or 'ls /sys/class/net/' to see all available
# interfaces.
#
# Interfaces to start at boot-up (in this order)
# Declare each interface then list in INTERFACES
# - prefix an entry in INTERFACES with a ! to disable it
# - no hyphens in your interface names - Bash doesn't like it
#
# Note: to use DHCP, set your interface to be "dhcp" (eth0="dhcp")
#
lo="lo 127.0.0.1"
# eth0="eth0 192.168.0.2 netmask 255.255.255.0 broadcast 192.168.0.255"
eth0="dhcp"
INTERFACES=(lo eth0)
#
# Routes to start at boot-up (in this order)
# Declare each route then list in ROUTES
# - prefix an entry in ROUTES with a ! to disable it
#
# gateway="default gw 192.168.0.1"
ROUTES=(!gateway)
#
# Enable these network profiles at boot-up. These are only useful
# if you happen to need multiple network configurations (ie, laptop users)
# - set to 'menu' to present a menu during boot-up (dialog package required)
# - prefix an entry with a ! to disable it
#
# Network profiles are found in /etc/network-profiles
#
#NET_PROFILES=(main)

#
# -----------------------------------------------------------------------
# DAEMONS
# -----------------------------------------------------------------------
#
# Daemons to start at boot-up (in this order)
# - prefix a daemon with a ! to disable it
# - prefix a daemon with a @ to start it up in the background
#
### handy - @hal - out due to worker. @fam replaced by gamin, which auto loads ###

DAEMONS=(syslog-ng network rpcbind nfs-common @netfs @crond @sshd @transmission-daemon @alsa @stb-sdmin @gpm)

# End of file

_____________________


Apart from that you make settings in pacman.conf regarding the way you want your rolling release to work; which repo's, any packages you want to block from upgrading & such.

All of which is really easy, & for most people what they do when they are installing Arch may very well be all they ever do in this file, though it certainly does have some powerful tricks built in, that are very easy to apply.

In the example below, I am using the IgnorePkg = command to stop NeroLinux from being upgraded from AUR & the other 5 packages on that line I'm blocking because AMDs current catalyst 9.10, is incompatible with xserver 1.74 (hopefully at the end of this month when catalyst 9.11 comes AMD have fixed that problem & I can upgrade those files?):

_________________


#
# /etc/pacman.conf
#
# See the pacman manpage for option directives

#
# GENERAL OPTIONS
#
[options]
# handy's happy to stick with nerolinux 3.5 *** the rest so catalyst
# can survive an Xorg 1.7 upgrade that it is incompatible with.
IgnorePkg = nerolinux xf86-video-vesa xorg-server xf86-input-evdev xf86-input-keyboard xf86-input-mouse

# 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
#XferCommand = /usr/bin/wget --passive-ftp -c -O %o %u

#
# 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
#
# 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.
#

# Testing is disabled by default. To enable, uncomment the following
# two lines. You can add preferred servers immediately after the header,
# and they will be used before the default mirrors.

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

# Unstable is disabled by default. To enable, uncomment the following
# two lines. You can add preferred servers immediately after the header,
# and they will be used before the default mirrors.
#[unstable]
#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


[archlinuxfr]
# The following repo' is required by yaourt
Server = http://repo.archlinux.fr/x86_64


[arch-games]
# Toronto, Canada, main mirror
Server = http://arch.twilightlair.net/games/x86_64

# Nürnberg, Germany, maintainer: Svenstaro
Server = http://pseudoform.org/arch-games/games/x86_64

# Düsseldorf, Germany, maintainer: s4msung
Server = http://repo.exigen.org/arch/games/x86_64

______________


Beyond that there exists the /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist which is full of all of the available mirrors of the standard Arch system repos. There is a command you can run which tests the repos & tells you which are the fastest. I have about a dozen with the last one being the arch.org repo. If for whatever reason they all fail, (happened 3 times in about 20 months) I know something strange is going on & look into it further (Oz Telstra has been responsible each time).

There are also other simple files that may require simple modification for various network configurations, & other options, all of which are covered in detail in the Arch wiki.

Those listed above are really where the vast majority of the action is though.

The Arch system IS simple. It has to be, because I can get into the guts of it & fix/modify things. I consider myself to be a Linux beginner; I require the simplicity of Arch. Any other distro, & I've used quite a few, are just far too complicated for my mind to be able to get a handle on.

They just have too many system files & configuration files for me, & my memory is just not good enough to handle that kind of complexity anymore.

[Xbehave]

I guess Arch is hated by users who failed installing/maintaining it.
It might also be related to arch's law:

As a thread grows on the ubuntuforums the probability of somebody recommending arch tends to 1
Even if the thread has nothing to do with arch or any other distro, Hell if you start a thread about tuna, it's just a matter of time! I quite like arch as a distro, i just hate a lot of the users, I mean there is nothing wrong with being a big fan of a DIY style distro but pretending its as easy as ubuntu/debian/fedora and co is just silly. Funnily enough i haven't seen any of the annoying ones in a thread that is actually about arch.

[SomeGuyDude]

Knowing your way around those files is amazing, yes. And it helps you understand what's going on, as opposed to having a GUI that says "this stuff runs at startup" without letting the user know exactly how it controls anything. Also keeps that boot time good and low (if that matters to you).

[SomeGuyDude]

It might also be related to arch's law:

Even if the thread has nothing to do with arch or any other distro, Hell if you start a thread about tuna, it's just a matter of time! I quite like arch as a distro, i just hate a lot of the users, I mean there is nothing wrong with being a big fan of a DIY style distro but pretending its as easy as ubuntu/debian/fedora and co is just silly. Funnily enough i haven't seen any of the annoying ones in a thread that is actually about arch.

Yes, it's very strange that in this thread about Arch people are talking about Arch. :confused:

No one said Arch is "easy", but it's not "difficult" if you're able to actually follow the directions. When people show up and whine that they didn't get Arch working after saying they didn't read the guide they're not gonna get much by way of sympathy.

[Skripka]

Yes, it's very strange that in this thread about Arch people are talking about Arch. :confused:

No one said Arch is "easy", but it's not "difficult" if you're able to actually follow the directions. When people show up and whine that they didn't get Arch working after saying they didn't read the guide they're not gonna get much by way of sympathy.

Don't mind XBehave, he needs more Tacos in his diet.

[~sHyLoCk~]

Don't mind XBehave, he needs more Tacos in his diet.

That should be put in the Beginner's guide as a requirement before installing arch. :lolflag:

[pwnst*r]

Hell if you start a thread about tuna, it's just a matter of time!

lol

[handy]

Don't mind XBehave, he needs more Tacos in his diet.

Skripka, is your real name Allan?

[Paqman]

Personally, i don't see the point in using Linux if you're not willing to spend some time to learn how it works.

I'd say there's traditionally been a large number of Linux users who are like this. But the usability and quality improvements in desktop Linux in recent years mean there's now also a lot of folks who just want the OS to run their apps reliably, and don't want to get under the hood. Should those people be running a proprietary OS in your opinion?



If you do not want to administrate, Arch is definitely not your distro. It is not for everyone, but neither is Ubuntu.

My point exactly. Arch's design is based on a certain fairly well-developed design philosophy. At the end of the day however, the "Arch Way" is just an opinion, even if some people mistakenly present it as fact. What one person finds "simple" or convenient is not what the next person does. Which is why we have all these different distros. That's a good thing.

[Pasdar]

When I say those commands will do jack $%^&, I don't mean that they will not have any response from the OS (duh :rolleyes: ). What I meant is that that guide is there for a reason and it contains 300+ commands and 25 pages of instructions for a reason. That reason is that you have a fully operable OS. Now of course I can easily type pacman -S (random DE) and get it over with, but you think my headache is going to end there? no way! that would mean the whole guide is BS... obviously many things would still have to be installed and configured.

[LookTJ]

When I say those commands will do jack $%^&, I don't mean that they will not have any response from the OS (duh :rolleyes: ). What I meant is that that guide is there for a reason and it contains 300+ commands and 25 pages of instructions for a reason. That reason is that you have a fully operable OS. Now of course I can easily type pacman -S (random DE) and get it over with, but you think my headache is going to end there? no way! that would mean the whole guide is BS... obviously many things would still have to be installed and configured.
You know you don't need to put in every command that is on the Beginner's Guide, it's just a bunch of choices and you can put in the command if you want it. You don't have to install everything that Arch has to offer in the Beginner Guide. Arch is meant to setup what you want without installing unneeded stuff.

Good luck with whatever you want to pursue in Arch if you decide to put more time into experimenting it. :)

[mivo]

What I meant is that that guide is there for a reason and it contains 300+ commands and 25 pages of instructions for a reason.

And that reason is that the Beginner's Guide doesn't give you just one choice, but multiple ones, and discusses each of these choices. But perhaps your computer has ten different wireless adapters, and you want to install twelve or more DEs/WMs, then sure, you will need more commands than someone whose system only has one wireless adapter and who is content with starting out with just one DE.

The Beginner's Guide is available in printed form, too.

[whitefort]

I had Arch on my PC for a year or so, and (mostly) loved the experience.

I found that the setup Wiki was as close to perfect as you could get - except when you ran into some odd hardware quirk or somesuch, and then it was a bit of a nightmare to set it up. Thankfully the Arch forum was almost as helpful as the Ubuntu forum.

In spite of all this, there were certain things I never did get to work in Arch. Compiz, for example... And I remember that getting wireless to work was a major three-act drama.

I got the feeling that Arch was very much a "tinkerer's distro", and since I enjoyed tinkering, I loved it.

Then life got busier, and I found it stopped being fun every time the rolling upgrade system broke something. After one particularly fraught weekend of trying to repair some upgrade damage, I just said a rude word or two and dug out an old Ubuntu disk.

But Arch is a bit like a drug, and I still (frequently!!) find myself daydreaming about taking another hit.

I actually tried it in Virtualbox just last week, but it seems there's something in the current version that refuses to play with Virtualbox.

Dang... in spite of all the above, I'm getting a real hankering for Arch again! It really IS like a drug!!!

[SomeGuyDude]

And that reason is that the Beginner's Guide doesn't give you just one choice, but multiple ones, and discusses each of these choices. But perhaps your computer has ten different wireless adapters, and you want to install twelve or more DEs/WMs, then sure, you will need more commands than someone whose system only has one wireless adapter and who is content with starting out with just one DE.

The Beginner's Guide is available in printed form, too.

Yeah a whole lot of the Beginners Guide is stuff you probably have no need to do. It involves every possible DE/WM, gives a longwinded explanation of fstab and mkinitcpio which the user needn't touch.

[CRUDE]

Lotsa replies here. I didn't mean to flame, but since the ball is in my court now, i'll have to kick it back:

The installation requires WAY more than 20 commands to install this. The commands chriss posted will do jack $%^&*. I started following the guide from the following step: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginners'_Guide#Step_2:_Update.2C_Sync.2C_and_Upg rade_the_system_with_pacman

Everything before that step I did on my own. From that point alone you'll have to go through nearly 100 commands, not to mention configuring things and what not. Just go count if you feel like it.

I have another thing to say. I think having such a guide is absolute BS. I read many people actually follow it from beginning to the end... if so many people follow this from beginning to the end, why on earth wouldn't you then automate the stupid list of commands and get it over with in the first place? If its a question of choice, then you could instead make a script and ask people to comment # everything they don't want to have installed from the standard guide... tada... same result and you don't have to read through 25 pages on just getting a basic OS with GUI running.

If you read through my post, you'll see that I didn't say anything negative about the OS... I wouldn't even call it criticism, it was merely an experience that some think I should have kept to myself apparently...

Because the Beginners' Guide and adding a GUI is optional.

Why don't they automate "GUI? Y/N"?

Because that's more work on the developers and less on the users. Arch is a small distro, and as such it is much easier to contribute to it. No politics like here or Debian.

This comes at a cost, even though most people that use it don't see it like that. The developers don't have time (thank god) to troubleshoot GUIs.

Quite frankly, you're not the intended audience. Deal with it.

[~sHyLoCk~]

Why don't they automate "GUI? Y/N"?

Because that's more work on the developers and less on the users. Arch is a small distro, and as such it is much easier to contribute to it. No politics like here or Debian.

This comes at a cost, even though most people that use it don't see it like that. The developers don't have time (thank god) to troubleshoot GUIs.

Quite frankly, you're not the intended audience. Deal with it.

I don't think that's quite the reason. Lack of developer's time is hardly the issue here. It's all about the Arch way sticking true to KISS. That's the reason nothing is automated and no GUI tools bundled,heck no X provided either, install it as you like. That's the point of Arch.

[CRUDE]

Considering that there's part of the AIF that doesn't work/plain out doesn't make sense (the installer "suggests" /etc as a separate partition, for example) I stand by what I said about them not having time/not caring.

Arch is arguably a combination of the best features from each distro. Up to date, no compiling times, ports, lite, unassuming, etc.

The only feature one might miss is package signing. This is the area where I recognize we are sorely lacking.

Other than that, marking it as "unstable" is pretty much a given. It is always syncing with upstream, and that's a feature, not a fault.

[koleoptero]

Yeah a whole lot of the Beginners Guide is stuff you probably have no need to do. It involves every possible DE/WM, gives a longwinded explanation of fstab and mkinitcpio which the user needn't touch.

:roll:

[SuperSonic4]

Rolling Release + Pacman + AUR + Groups + KDEmod is why I use arch

[Barrucadu]

The only feature one might miss is package signing. This is the area where I recognize we are sorely lacking.
I believe they're working on that.

[1111peoy]

got damnit! This week is a linux urge week for me. Still that I use windows 100% of my time. I miss to use linux, and I have been thinking alot about Arch Linux, but damn! Then I will end up missing windows XD

Oh. and another thing.. Im gonna start up a forum in the near future.. should I go for miniBB (http://www.minibb.com/)or fluxBB (http://fluxbb.org/)?

EDIT: And another another thing.. does Arch works best with KDE or Gnome ?:P

[jocheem67]

I would encourage people to try it if they have a few hours on their hands and love Linux. I have had to tweak a few things here and there, but I must say the online documentation left the experiences rather painless.

I just converted to Arch on my desktop. I consider myself to be a linux-enthusiast, not an expert though...thought that I needed something more challenging than the plain old ubuntu-install, which after three years is pretty known now.
I' m very happy with the move. Great wiki, which lets nothing uncovered up 'til now.
Got a running system in two tries. No hassle actually, though I do feel that starting with ubuntu, was a good move. It makes the understanding of Arch easier. It sure is snappier than Ubuntu, that' s for sure.:D

I really don't understand the little annoyances in this thread. Everyone his own favors.

[kellemes]

Sorry old mate, you think you know what you are talking about.

Anyway, enjoy the ride. ;)

No need to be this arrogant.

[kellemes]

EDIT: And another another thing.. does Arch works best with KDE or Gnome ?:P

Arch works best when setup right.. doesn't matter what wm.
Personally using Gnome currently.

[SuperSonic4]

got damnit! This week is a linux urge week for me. Still that I use windows 100% of my time. I miss to use linux, and I have been thinking alot about Arch Linux, but damn! Then I will end up missing windows XD

Oh. and another thing.. Im gonna start up a forum in the near future.. should I go for miniBB (http://www.minibb.com/)or fluxBB (http://fluxbb.org/)?

EDIT: And another another thing.. does Arch works best with KDE or Gnome ?:P

It works with either so pick your favourite. There is less difference between KDE in extra and KDEmod from the Chakra guys now then in KDE 3.

My personal favourite is KDEmod

[mivo]

EDIT: And another another thing.. does Arch works best with KDE or Gnome ?:P

I can work well with any DE. KDEmod for Arch is really beautiful, though, and is one of the best KDE experiences to be had. So if you are deciding between Gnome and KDE on Arch, I would suggest to give KDEmod a try (http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/KDEmod). Gnome will be very vanilla, like most of the DE packages in Arch, so you may have to work on beautifying it. There is a Arch wiki entry for Gnome too.

[MisfitI38]

..I found that the setup Wiki was as close to perfect as you could get

I am always glad when people compliment the guide, and referring to it as 'as close to perfect as you could get' is music to my ears-- thanks.


- except when you ran into some odd hardware quirk or somesuch, and then it was a bit of a nightmare to set it up. Thankfully the Arch forum was almost as helpful as the Ubuntu forum...

This is where one's own UNIX competence comes into the Arch equation; the more familiar you are with UNIX/GNU/Linux methodology, the more you will get out of Arch.
Also, glad you found the forums helpful.

[~sHyLoCk~]

I don't like KDEmod, I just use Arch's vanilla KDE. Package splitting ftw!

[1111peoy]

KDEmod looks good!:) gonna try it when I have decided to install linux. Print out the beginners manual even If I have good experience with the command line :P

[SomeGuyDude]

:roll:

Can I help you with something?

[~sHyLoCk~]

Print out the beginners manual even If I have good experience with the command line :P

An easy way (http://wp.me/pBvUo-2c).

[Skripka]

I don't like KDEmod, I just use Arch's vanilla KDE. Package splitting ftw!

I'll second this. KDEMod devs are nice guys, but they have been going down the rabbit hole lately.

[SuperSonic4]

I'll second this. KDEMod devs are nice guys, but they have been going down the rabbit hole lately.

What's the main difference between them? It seems like KDEmod have more packages but that could just be because they prefix packages with kdemod

[Skripka]

What's the main difference between them? It seems like KDEmod have more packages but that could just be because they prefix packages with kdemod

There are several patches they add to Qt and a few other places. That I don't mind...Several of the updates to the KDE4.2.* took WEEKS for 64bit, versus days for i686, that annoyed me greatly-and caused me to go to Vanilla KDE prior to splitting. What is bizzaro is that they're developing a Qt auto-update software client-for friggin Arch! Talk about crazy, albeit perhaps well-meaning ideas.

[bailout]

I keep getting tempted to try Arch. The rolling release sounds attractive compared to the six monthly upgrade/reinstall of the buntus. I am sure I could work my way through the install guide but am just worried about how much problem solving and fixing needs to be done with the updates. These threads always have lots of people saying how stable it is but the Arch forums are full of 'how do I fix this' posts :)

I installed pclos on my laptop thinking it might offer the rolling release plus an easier install. Perhaps I will try Arch on there sometime.

[Dharmachakra]

I keep getting tempted to try Arch. The rolling release sounds attractive compared to the six monthly upgrade/reinstall of the buntus. I am sure I could work my way through the install guide but am just worried about how much problem solving and fixing needs to be done with the updates. These threads always have lots of people saying how stable it is but the Arch forums are full of 'how do I fix this' posts :)

I installed pclos on my laptop thinking it might offer the rolling release plus an easier install. Perhaps I will try Arch on there sometime.

To be fair, if you do decide to try Arch, you're going to experience more trouble with upgrades. I'm not saying you're going to have problems all the time, but sometimes there are headaches.

Another thing is that the 'rolling-release' experience that most users seem to want is perfectly manageable in Ubuntu via PPA's.

[mivo]

These threads always have lots of people saying how stable it is but the Arch forums are full of 'how do I fix this' posts :)

The only (two) breakages I had were related to Xorg. The latest one just on the weekend, though the problem didn't have anything to do with Arch. Xorg 1.7 no longer supports the old Nvidia drivers, and Nvidia doesn't support the older cards in their newest driver. Boom! :) One of them will hopefully tend to it.

How did I fix it? I downgraded to Xorg 1.6.3, and that was all it took. Pacman (the package manager of Arch) keeps previous versions, unless you configure it differently or manually purge the archives.

[SuperSonic4]

I keep getting tempted to try Arch. The rolling release sounds attractive compared to the six monthly upgrade/reinstall of the buntus. I am sure I could work my way through the install guide but am just worried about how much problem solving and fixing needs to be done with the updates. These threads always have lots of people saying how stable it is but the Arch forums are full of 'how do I fix this' posts :)

I installed pclos on my laptop thinking it might offer the rolling release plus an easier install. Perhaps I will try Arch on there sometime.

Only the kernel and xorg seem to cause problems so if you see them appear in pacman -Syu then check out the Arch home page to see if anything has been posted about it

[markp1989]

The only (two) breakages I had were related to Xorg. The latest one just on the weekend, though the problem didn't have anything to do with Arch. Xorg 1.7 no longer supports the old Nvidia drivers, and Nvidia doesn't support the older cards in their newest driver. Boom! :) One of them will hopefully tend to it.

How did I fix it? I downgraded to Xorg 1.6.3, and that was all it took. Pacman (the package manager of Arch) keeps previous versions, unless you configure it differently or manually purge the archives.

i have had arch on my desktop for quite a while the only upgrade brake i had was a new version of xorg required to have hal running, and i didnt have hal set to start on boot because i didnt need it before.

this was a long time ago, and a quick check of the arch site told me what was wrong, so it was easy 2 fix

[koleoptero]

Can I help you with something?
No thank you.

[chucky chuckaluck]

I keep getting tempted to try Arch. The rolling release sounds attractive compared to the six monthly upgrade/reinstall of the buntus. I am sure I could work my way through the install guide but am just worried about how much problem solving and fixing needs to be done with the updates. These threads always have lots of people saying how stable it is but the Arch forums are full of 'how do I fix this' posts :)

it's actually easier than reputed. i'm pretty much an unthorough end user, so if i can use it, most anyone with more competence can. it really depends on what you want: are you a "nothing but what i need" type of person, or a "just in case..." type of person?

[handy]

Often the easiest way out of trouble that you have upgraded into with Arch is to downgrade your way out of it, then watch the Arch forum for the solution or post the problem yourself if no one else has.

Here is an how-to for downgrading:

http://www.ostalk.org/showthread.php?tid=78

This one is for finding a kernel, most useful if you need to downgrade the kernel & you have no packages in your /var/cache/packman/pkg/ :

http://www.ostalk.org/showthread.php?tid=79

[handy]

No need to be this arrogant.

Sorry, but if you had read the posts, the man has never used Linux & was telling people how to do things, & that all Linux kernel based distros are essentially the same. Which if you have used a variety of them you know is not true, & that the techniques, config files, package management, installation & such can vary dramatically between distros.

Sometimes we have to be told.

I did so kindly & I hold no animosity for the person whatsoever I wish him all the very best, & welcome him to the Linux fold, as from what he has posted recently he is actually going to install a distro.

Good news all round I say. :)

[Polygon]

Arch is pretty bad in my opinion. Its just not worth the trouble (I used it for about a year).

Almost no useful software is in the main repositiories.

The useful software that is not in the main repos are in the AUR, which is community maintained. Often tons of software are out of date, or the PKGBUILD files do not work correctly, leading to compile errors, or in my case one time, A PACKAGE CREATED WITH NO FILES IN IT! And not only that, AUR packages often required other AUR packages, requring you to spend like 30 minutes to an hour in some cases just to install 1 program that should of taken seconds to install.

Course, there are AUR programs to install stuff from the AUR easily, but those never worked for me, got random errors.

They shipped a buggy gnome release that makes you LOSE DATA because gnome randomly crashes back to the login screen because gdm spawns on the wrong tty. And this tiny little bug hadn't been fixed for 2 weeks, and after that, I have no idea because I uninstalled it and installed ubuntu karmic.

They updated CUPS and broke old configuration files and made printing not work, but instead, FREEZING MY PRINTER AND COMPUTER because the syntax changed of the configuration files or something

nothing is integrated, firefox does not know what programs can open what file extensions if you double click them in the downloads window or select 'open' in the save as window.


Arc linux worked, and yes it used a lot less resources, but it felt to me like it was held together by twine and duct tape, and that was very evident by their lack of testing with shipping cups and gnome releases that broke stuff for a LOT of users.


I just want my OS to you know, WORK? I have had enough bad experiences with windows xp and upgrading the OS causing more problems then its supposed to fix, but geez. I can google and scour the internet and edit config files as well as the next guy, but sometimes i don't have TIME to be doing that. If i'm scared to update my computer, I'm using the wrong linux distro, or OS in general.

[snowpine]

They shipped a buggy gnome release that makes you LOSE DATA because gnome randomly crashes back to the login screen because gdm spawns on the wrong tty. And this tiny little bug hadn't been fixed for 2 weeks, and after that, I have no idea because I uninstalled it and installed ubuntu karmic.


Hi Polygon, sorry to hear about your bad Arch experience. Most of your problems could have been avoided by following the "Arch Beginners Guide" as suggested many times in this thread. For example:


Then edit your /etc/gdm/custom.conf and in the [servers] section add:

0=Standard vt7


The manual/automatic transmission analogy earlier in this thread was a good one. I stalled out a few times learning to drive stick, but now I like the feeling of control it gives me. Some people prefer automatic.

[CRUDE]

These threads always have lots of people saying how stable it is but the Arch forums are full of 'how do I fix this' posts :)
Please link to a distro forum that isn't filled with posts like these.

It's not like most people that go to sofware forums, irc channels and mailing lists do so because they need support.

[1111peoy]

I am running arch linux now from Sun ViritualBox, and guess what? It is very friendly with the command line.. if you read the beginners guide.. very easy and smooth! Gonna run Arch via the viritualbox for a few days and see if I enjoy it more than using my windows :p

[Xbehave]

Please link to a distro forum that isn't filled with posts like these.

It's not like most people that go to sofware forums, irc channels and mailing lists do so because they need support.
TBF it's just there are so many people who post on UF saying the sun shines out of arch's bum that your lead to belive its perfect AND trivial to install AND lightweight AND has shiny new graphics AND ...

If you want a Rolling Release it is defiantly a distro to look at (along with debian and others), but fear an upgrade can (and did for me, yes i did follow the begginers guide and the install went fine) break an install, was too much for me to keep it around, my short time on it taught me more about legacy systems than anything useful:
the improved bsd style init is simple but not very flexible
xorg.conf is a thing of the past now.

[handy]

I am running arch linux now from Sun ViritualBox, and guess what? It is very friendly with the command line.. if you read the beginners guide.. very easy and smooth! Gonna run Arch via the viritualbox for a few days and see if I enjoy it more than using my windows :p

Way to go!

Good on you for doing it.

I hope it works out well. :)

[handy]

TBF it's just there are so many people who post on UF saying the sun shines out of arch's bum that your lead to belive its perfect AND trivial to install AND lightweight AND has shiny new graphics AND ...

Arch certainly has its problems too.

Dealing with the AMD/ATi catalyst driver has been a total nightmare (with some patches of respite) forever. Because Arch is near cutting edge with package versions, it really creates problems when relying on closed source packages that can't keep up with the speed of the GNU/FOSS development.

Ubuntu has got it all over Arch in that area, specifically since Ubuntu is officially supported by AMD/ATi.

I went back to catalyst 9.10 from the open-source drivers, because 9.10 was a fairly good release & I wanted to play 3D games, & roughly a week after the release of catalyst 9.10, Arch put xorg 1.7 in the repo's which is totally incompatible with catalyst 9.10!

So then we had to work out which packages to block from upgrading if we still wanted to use catalyst. This started out at about 59 packages but fairly quickly we found that only 5 (or 6 for notebook users) needed to be blocked.

Apart from this mess, (that many Arch ATi users have been dealing with one way or another for a looong time) since March 2008 I've had 3 or 4 problems that came through in upgrades. The first were tough, they taught me how to downgrade out of trouble, (which truly is very easy when you know how). I posted links to a couple of how-to's I wrote on the subject a little earlier in this thread.



...
the improved bsd style init is simple but not very flexible

Perhaps? Though I have never found it wanting, but I only do what I do.



xorg.conf is a thing of the past now.

Not for me, it seems to still depend on the hardware you are using as to whether you need an xorg.conf or not.
___________

Arch is definitely NOT for everyone, I can understand that Arch would be incredibly irritating for many computer users, they would find it to be a hell of a way to use a computer, without a doubt.

For some of us though it is perfectly suitable, to the point that it is the best system that we have found to date, though it certainly is still far from perfect.

[karlmp]

xorg.conf is a thing of the past now.

I'm editing xorg right now in kubuntu karmic

[jocheem67]

I've got a working Arch install now for two days and been happily fiddling around with it..first installed KDE but realized it's better to use an environment that I already know pretty well. Gnome it is.
Actually, I think I got all the software working for my normal computer-needs: think video , audio, printing, flash, wireless, restricted codecs, mounting, mail and so on...
The best thing is the speed, it's way quicker than other OS'ses I've been using. Also nice that of a lot of daemons and services I actually learned now what they do.
Things to do: learning pacman a bit better, learning AUR..
Not nice: font-rendering is still a bit messy...

All in all I'm happy with Arch...

Update: I did try to do an install on my laptop, there's no way that grub will install itself properly.. bah...:(

[kellemes]

Things to do: learning pacman a bit better, learning AUR..

Yaourt (http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Yaourt)

[handy]

@jocheem67: Have a search in the Arch wiki for fonts, you should find that you will be able to display your fonts beautifully.

[Barrucadu]

These threads always have lots of people saying how stable it is but the Arch forums are full of 'how do I fix this' posts :)
People don't tend to make threads after every upgrade saying "Everything worked great!" :p

[lethalfang]

I just install Arch Linux on my 2nd hard drive. It took me two days (because I spent a couple of hours each day). I like to fiddle around with computers, so I kinda enjoyed doing it.
But more importantly, I must have my computer to get the work done for me. I cannot afford to have an OS break down when I need it. So while I'll definitely keep Arch Linux to play with, I don't know if it'll ever be my primary OS on a production desktop.

[insane_alien]

you can always make a script to automate it if you want.

[docus]

...Double post... ):P

[docus]

I tried to install Arch but just couldn't get it to work. I followed the beginner's guide closely (although TBH some of it was greek to me - and I'm a fairly confident computer user, albeit still a Linux novice). When the system was installed and I was confronted with the command prompt, I couldn't work out how to connect my wireless (Thinkpad T60, Atheros wireless card). I was a bit disappointed as I really like the idea of Arch, but I guess my understanding just isn't where it needs to be yet - I'll try again in a few months! (Embarrassing admission time: once I had the base system installed I couldn't even bring up the conf files - it said 'permission denied' and I didn't know what to do! But even if I had been able to, I wouldn't have known what to amend... :lolflag: )

On a separate note, I installed Ubuntu 9.10 afterwards - a clean install - and it works PERFECTLY. No problems at all (yet... fingers crossed...) - everything's smooth, fast and shiny! For me, this is the best version of Ubuntu yet (user since 8.10).

[nothingspecial]

I wouldn`t worry about it. Last time I installed Arch I spent hours setting it up how I wanted it before realising it was almost exactly the same as my ubuntu install.......so what was the point in that?

Now, I just install Ubuntu server and build a desktop from there.

[mivo]

How to set up wireless is covered in the Beginner's Guide, though. There is also a dedicated wiki page for it: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Wireless

I had some wireless issues on an older laptop, too. I installed the firmware (see above), but didn't do configuration through the command line as that had not worked (I still don't know why). Instead, I installed wicd (a network manager: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Wicd), logged into Xfce4 and used the wcid client GUI to set up wireless. Took two minutes and has been working ever since.

[-grubby]

Almost no useful software is in the main repositiories.


Depends on your definition of "Useful software."



[...]

I just want my OS to you know, WORK?

Then why did you use Arch? Arch is do it yourself.

[jocheem67]

It' s my fifth day now on Arch, and this evening I'm trying to get wine running through AUR/pkgbuild. It's not that easy actually, lots of dependencies to consider. Still very educational...
It's for sure now that I will keep this install and try to get it install all the software that I might need.
foobar, subrip, dvdfab are some win32-apps that I might need...

Tried to install Arch on my laptop, and failed cause Grub was giving me a very hard time. Error 17 and later on error 15. Put karmic on it as I need my laptop to just work..

However there is certainly some love 'tween me and Arch amerging.:D

[Dharmachakra]

It' s my fifth day now on Arch, and this evening I'm trying to get wine running through AUR/pkgbuild. It's not that easy actually, lots of dependencies to consider. Still very educational...


Just wondering; are you using yaourt or are you manually installing all the dependencies?

I've been lucky. I usually find any software I want in the repositories. The last time I went to the AUR was when I wanted to try out the fancy single-window GIMP.

[chucky chuckaluck]

These threads always have lots of people saying how stable it is but the Arch forums are full of 'how do I fix this' posts :)

i don't think they have a testimonials forum and they send all their zealots over here.

[mivo]

It' s my fifth day now on Arch, and this evening I'm trying to get wine running through AUR/pkgbuild.

Wine 1.1.32 is in the repository, which is the newest version. No need to use AUR for Wine. Just pacman -S wine, and it will take care of the dependencies automatically.

[tjwoosta]

These threads always have lots of people saying how stable it is but the Arch forums are full of 'how do I fix this' posts


lol, and Ubuntu forums aren't? 99% of the time its user incompetence not an actual distro issue.

[jocheem67]

Well, as a matter of fact I'm listening now to Antony ( If it be your will --- very beautiful ----) through foobar2000/wine. All seems fine.

I just went to AUR, did the "makepkg" for every dependency that I encountered...took me like 30 minutes to install a 32bit wine on my 64bit Arch..
Didn't take a look yet at yaourt.

With some messing around, I've got dvdfab and subrip running.....happy here....

[SuperSonic4]

Well, as a matter of fact I'm listening now to Antony ( If it be your will --- very beautiful ----) through foobar2000/wine. All seems fine.

I just went to AUR, did the "makepkg" for every dependency that I encountered...took me like 30 minutes to install a 32bit wine on my 64bit Arch..
Didn't take a look yet at yaourt.

Really? I'd have just installed the bin32 group
pacman -S lib32

[tjwoosta]

@ jocheem67

You really must check out yaourt. Its definitely one of arch's high points. It would have automatically compiled and installed that package plus all dependencies with a single command "yaourt -S packagename". Its literally exactly like pacman except it works with aur as if it were just another repo and compiles them for you. Plus it has nice colorized output.

[jocheem67]

Yeah well, I sure will...
Thanks.

[chucky chuckaluck]

+1 for yaourt. the 'easy install' is the way to go.

[Pogeymanz]

Or rather, I had a taste of Arch. hehe...

Installed the base system etc, etc... everything straightforward, went fast... didn't even look at the beginners guide... so I thought, if everything continues like this i'll have this system up and running pretty quickly... but i was wrong, lol... so the base system was installed, there I was with my black screen...

I knew I had to use pacman to install everything I needed, but didn't know what to install out of the top of my head. So I opened up the beginners guide... so anyway, right after I did pacman -S xorg... I checked how much I still had to go on the guide... and then I thought, "F that ... i'm not gonna go through all that"... lol

Lesson: Its seems that the older you get (not everyone of course), the less you feel like putting lots of time in such things.

So that's all the taste I had of Arch... ):P

*Currently downloading Chakra project to check that*

Yeah, it's certainly not for everyone. But how would have known that if you never tried? Am I right? ;)

Try Chakra, but don't expect it to be bug-free. As others have mentioned, it's pretty alpha stage.

[Pogeymanz]

I tried to install Arch but just couldn't get it to work. I followed the beginner's guide closely (although TBH some of it was greek to me - and I'm a fairly confident computer user, albeit still a Linux novice). When the system was installed and I was confronted with the command prompt, I couldn't work out how to connect my wireless (Thinkpad T60, Atheros wireless card). I was a bit disappointed as I really like the idea of Arch, but I guess my understanding just isn't where it needs to be yet - I'll try again in a few months! (Embarrassing admission time: once I had the base system installed I couldn't even bring up the conf files - it said 'permission denied' and I didn't know what to do! But even if I had been able to, I wouldn't have known what to amend... :lolflag: )

On a separate note, I installed Ubuntu 9.10 afterwards - a clean install - and it works PERFECTLY. No problems at all (yet... fingers crossed...) - everything's smooth, fast and shiny! For me, this is the best version of Ubuntu yet (user since 8.10).

Yes, wireless is very tricky if you've never done it before. If you have access to a wired connection, you should try to use that first and set up your wireless once you get passed other stuff. That's what I did the first time on my laptop. Once you do it, it's not too hard.

[CRUDE]

TBF it's just there are so many people who post on UF saying the sun shines out of arch's bum that your lead to belive its perfect AND trivial to install AND lightweight AND has shiny new graphics AND ...

If you want a Rolling Release it is defiantly a distro to look at (along with debian and others), but fear an upgrade can (and did for me, yes i did follow the begginers guide and the install went fine) break an install, was too much for me to keep it around, my short time on it taught me more about legacy systems than anything useful:
the improved bsd style init is simple but not very flexible
xorg.conf is a thing of the past now.
You quoted it but didn't respond.

Every software forum is filled with threads asking for support.

You and the rest are criticizing design decisions, not problems. It all amounts to "Arch should be more like xyz".

Then what's the point? Go install xyz instead.

[handy]

I tried to install Arch but just couldn't get it to work. I followed the beginner's guide closely (although TBH some of it was greek to me - and I'm a fairly confident computer user, albeit still a Linux novice). When the system was installed and I was confronted with the command prompt, I couldn't work out how to connect my wireless (Thinkpad T60, Atheros wireless card). I was a bit disappointed as I really like the idea of Arch, but I guess my understanding just isn't where it needs to be yet - I'll try again in a few months! (Embarrassing admission time: once I had the base system installed I couldn't even bring up the conf files - it said 'permission denied' and I didn't know what to do! But even if I had been able to, I wouldn't have known what to amend... :lolflag: )

A wireless internet failure is (I think) the most likely hardware problem to stop an Arch installation. Particularly with a first time user.

Hopefully next time you can get past that roadblock. The wiki & forum would be a good place to start before you attempt the install. Look for information on your wireless chipset, & if need be post the question in the forum. If it is possible, you will be told how. :)


I wouldn`t worry about it. Last time I installed Arch I spent hours setting it up how I wanted it before realising it was almost exactly the same as my ubuntu install.......so what was the point in that?

That sure is a BIG almost you have there:

Arch package management, in combination with the rolling release upgrade system; plus the incredibly simple configuration system that is Arch inherent, are the core reasons why people use Arch.

These systems meld together beautifully in combination with the install only what you desire kind of system build that Arch is.

All of this makes Arch, more simple. But you still have to spend the time to learn how this simple works. :)

Yes, you can start with a minimal install of Ubuntu & build from there. That is where the similarities stop.

The Arch philosophy is KISS.

The Ubuntu philosophy (which is also great) is to please as many people as you possibly can.

Which makes it far more complicated under the hood, due to the additional intermediate layers that usually provide users with a GUI to make their configuration choices through. Apart from the "usual" installation method providing a great variety of software on the initial install.

The BSD-style init, really makes it possible for a dumb old bustard like myself, suffering from a dramatically deteriorating memory, able to remember where to go to do what I must do when for whatever reason I must do it:

Q) What exactly is this 'BSD-style' init framework I keep hearing about?

Part of BSD's heritage is the simple init framework that it has incorporated. The main difference between a BSD init and a sysV init is that Arch's BSD-style init uses a single file, /etc/rc.conf, to point to scripts within a single directory, etc/rc.d/, for all system services, regardless of runlevel.

A sysV init, on the other hand, would use a directory for each runlevel:/etc/rc.0,1,2,3,4,5,6 with a convoluted array of symlinks within the directory; one for each service, and each symlink pointing to a corresponding script in the /etc/init.d/ directory. Needless to say, the SysV method is much more complex; it could easily contain dozens of symlinks in each /etc/rc. directory. Keeping in line with its simple philosophy, Arch uses the BSD-style init.

[handy]

i don't think they have a testimonials forum and they send all their zealots over here.

Get out of this thread!

You're banished.

[Edit:] They do have the "The Official Unofficial 'Arch is Best' Thread".

Which is probably counter productive as far as my trying to water down people's chauvinism is concerned, but anyway the link follows.

It is worth noting the date that it was started & that there are only (as of this writing) 365 posts, from the over 29,000 registered users, who have posted in it. Many of those 365 posts would have been by users who posted more than once.

It is the place where noobs gush. We usually get over that & become pragmatic. :):

http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=12926

[SomeGuyDude]

People don't tend to make threads after every upgrade saying "Everything worked great!" :p

Yeah, Arch's forums aren't really chit-chatty. They're more diagnostic and help related, so of COURSE they'll be chock full of people with issues. That's the only reason I go there is to identify and (occasionally) help with problems.

It's probably why so many Archers are over here. The Arch board kinda lacks a cafe atmosphere. It's not like I'm out in the Ubuntu help areas saying "try Arch!" in all the support threads.

[Grifulkin]

Wow I can't believe how long this thread has become, it shouldn't have been anywhere near as long. But I can't really say much talking about arch is what we do here alot, and I am not knocking that, I use arch as well.

[jocheem67]

I too am starting to see the advantages of the way Arch like to let itself configure...it's very simple in design..you got to be prepared to dig yourself into nano or vim. That's not a bad thing.
The philosophy is pretty clear.

[corsakh]

I did not read the OP, but I just want to say that I tried a bicycle on a freeway the other day... I don't like bicycles any more :( Now I have a large hospital bill.

Beware people: bicycles are very bad for you health! And your pocket!

[nothingspecial]

That sure is a BIG almost you have there:

Oh I know it`s different under the hood.

What I meant was by the time I finished, I had the same openbox config, the same apps, etc etc. So as you sit at the computer going about your daily business, it looks and does exactly the same things without any noticable performance benefit.

[handy]

Oh I know it`s different under the hood.

What I meant was by the time I finished, I had the same openbox config, the same apps, etc etc. So as you sit at the computer going about your daily business, it looks and does exactly the same things without any noticable performance benefit.

I experience a very noticeable performance benefit, when I use Arch. Arch & Gnome, the way I started, was quite noticeably faster than Ubuntu.

When I moved onto Xfce, it too was much faster than Xubuntu. Openbox/Xfce4-panel is also quite noticeably faster than Crunchbang.

Arch has much less going on under the hood to slow it down. If someone's Arch install is not noticeably faster than Ubuntu using the same DE or WM, then the Arch setup is not yet optimal.

It can take a while to get to know Arch, during the process your configuration is being continually refined. The wonderful thing imho, is that your system doesn't get shot to pieces every time your distro says it's now time for an upgrade.

I have found that the refinements of over 20 months of living with the same installation of Arch, really has made it such a comfortable place to call home.

Many of us, never want to leave home for this reason.

Again, I say, so many others would consider the same situation to be a horrible way to compute.

Which is fine.

It is why there are literally hundreds of choices of distros, the BSDs & beyond, available to us today. :D

I love freedom of choice.

[nothingspecial]

But like I said, I install the server and build up from there.

(it`S main function is a server and rarely (in terms of uptime) runs X. The only reason it has a desktop is it resides in the garage and it`s a good place to escape :D)

So in my experience, arch + openbox vs ubuntu server + openbox = very little diference. I should also point out that the only gui app I run on anything like a regular basis is firefox (or chromium). So it`s not like I`m ripping dvds, running gimp and open office with a big fancy media manager going so I`m not comparing a heavy workload.

[Xbehave]

YYou and the rest are criticizing design decisions, not problems. It all amounts to "Arch should be more like xyz".

Then what's the point? Go install xyz instead.
Erm where do i say anything like that? I mean maybe there is a rendering bug in your browser because I never said arch should be anything it's not, just that certain users should stop pretending it is.

[chucky chuckaluck]

Get out of this thread!

You're banished.

"my distro, right or wrong..."

[Hallvor]

"my distro, right or wrong..."

Arch threads are always the most entertaining.


:popcorn:

[handy]

"my distro, right or wrong..."

The bottom line.

[sefs]

Or rather, I had a taste of Arch. hehe...

Installed the base system etc, etc... everything straightforward, went fast... didn't even look at the beginners guide... so I thought, if everything continues like this i'll have this system up and running pretty quickly... but i was wrong, lol... so the base system was installed, there I was with my black screen...

I knew I had to use pacman to install everything I needed, but didn't know what to install out of the top of my head. So I opened up the beginners guide... so anyway, right after I did pacman -S xorg... I checked how much I still had to go on the guide... and then I thought, "F that ... i'm not gonna go through all that"... lol

Lesson: Its seems that the older you get (not everyone of course), the less you feel like putting lots of time in such things.

So that's all the taste I had of Arch... ):P

*Currently downloading Chakra project to check that*

Fancy that. I downloaded it just yesterday to install in a vm to see what the big halabaloo is all about. I am procrastinating on it since I am mildly aware of the "work" to get it up and running and you are not helping at all.

[sefs]

I know, I was teasing.

I've read up on the Arch philosophy, and i'd have to say I don't really agree with it. In my opinion, automation is simplicity. Making the machine work harder to make my life easier is a Good Thing™, after all that's what they were invented for.

However, I can see that a certain subset of users like a pared-back, hands-on system, so Arch must be just the ticket for them.


Is this the system they use to train students in at universities? Such like pascal was used as an initial training language?

[handy]

The only way to know what any system is like is to use it, & use it long enough to become truly familiar with it.

Reading about something may prepare you for it somewhat, or guide you through a process, albeit one necessary to get you started.

None of which is the same as living there long enough for it to feel like home. Or, staying long enough to truly know the reasons why you don't want to live there.

Talk is cheap.

[Greg]

Yeah, Arch's forums aren't really chit-chatty. They're more diagnostic and help related, so of COURSE they'll be chock full of people with issues. That's the only reason I go there is to identify and (occasionally) help with problems.

It's probably why so many Archers are over here. The Arch board kinda lacks a cafe atmosphere. It's not like I'm out in the Ubuntu help areas saying "try Arch!" in all the support threads.

FluxBB is too sharp and pointy :P

[jocheem67]

After installing and setting up arch on my desktop, I installed it on my laptop. Gave me quite a few problems:
* two times "eth0" , both wired and wireless, which gave me sosme headaches to set up right.
* An AUR broadcom driver that wasn't cooperating very smoothly
* ACPI-problems, strangely my system wouldn't boot without an arch cd in the drive...seems gone now after updating.

It reminds of the problems that I had in earlier versions of ubuntu:lolflag:

Now it's running though, and am pretty excited that I was able to solve the problems.

[handy]

...
Now it's running though, and am pretty excited that I was able to solve the problems.

That's one of the things I like about Arch; due to the inherent simplicity of the Arch approach, & that it makes you learn about its core when you install it; it becomes so much easier (due to that simplicity) to be able to gradually grow your understanding of how it works, & so fix & modify.

What you experienced just gets easier the longer you use Arch (or anything for that matter) but the KISS suits me, 'cause I'm somewhat Linux stupid. :)

[jocheem67]

well here, I'm glad I started to explore ubuntu firstly and now move 'on' to Arch.
Example: mounting an external disk with read/write permissions for my normal user. Took me about an hour to figure out. Tought me stuff about fstab, mtab, hal, dbus, ntfs-3g...
After exploring the actual wiki's I've got it running. First through a static entry in fstab, decided that that's not the most charming road to follow and now got it running through hal/dbus.
Remember: using ubuntu I learned a bit about these processes/conf-files, but usually this stuff " just" works...using Arch I have to learn about them. Pretty okay , as that was the whole goal of my Arch experience.
Next task: to fiddle out how to power off my laptop as a normal user, as strangely that is a no-go;)

[phrostbyte]

Guys, this thread inspired me to make a Bash script that automates that Beginners guide. Anyone want to help with this? It should be fun. :D

[phrostbyte]

Anyone know any parser libraries that could do well on rc.conf? A lot of automation depends on editing rc.conf

[nothingspecial]

well here, I'm glad I started to explore ubuntu firstly and now move 'on' to Arch.
Example: mounting an external disk with read/write permissions for my normal user. Took me about an hour to figure out. Tought me stuff about fstab, mtab, hal, dbus, ntfs-3g...
After exploring the actual wiki's I've got it running. First through a static entry in fstab, decided that that's not the most charming road to follow and now got it running through hal/dbus.
Remember: using ubuntu I learned a bit about these processes/conf-files, but usually this stuff " just" works...using Arch I have to learn about them. Pretty okay , as that was the whole goal of my Arch experience.
Next task: to fiddle out how to power off my laptop as a normal user, as strangely that is a no-go;)


Haha, great if you`ve got the time :p

Funny thing is..... I learnt about (some) of that stuff messing about with Ubuntu...... and that`s (nearly/kind of) my point.

[gjoellee]

Installing, and getting a desktop ready in Arch does not take much longer time then installing Ubuntu. You're just using a lot of time because it is your first time. It is done in 1,2,3!

[handy]

well here, I'm glad I started to explore ubuntu firstly and now move 'on' to Arch.
Example: mounting an external disk with read/write permissions for my normal user. Took me about an hour to figure out. Tought me stuff about fstab, mtab, hal, dbus, ntfs-3g...
After exploring the actual wiki's I've got it running. First through a static entry in fstab, decided that that's not the most charming road to follow and now got it running through hal/dbus.
Remember: using ubuntu I learned a bit about these processes/conf-files, but usually this stuff " just" works...using Arch I have to learn about them. Pretty okay , as that was the whole goal of my Arch experience.
Next task: to fiddle out how to power off my laptop as a normal user, as strangely that is a no-go;)

You can also use an alias in ~/.bashrc to do things.

For example I have a couple of lines in mine that each allow me by typing a two letters to mount & umount my FreeNAS storage partition, as it is most often started after my workstation, has data backed up to it, & is then switched off.

My ~/.bashrc follows, it may give you some ideas for how you'd like to make one for yourself jocheem67:
__________

alias ls='ls --color=auto'

eval `dircolors -b`

#PS1='[\u@\h \W]\$ '

PS1='\[\e[0;32m\]\u\[\e[m\] \[\e[1;34m\]\w\[\e[m\] \[\e[m\] \[\e[1;32m\]\$ \[\e[m\]\[\e[1;37m\] '

if [ -f /etc/bash_completion ]; then
. /etc/bash_completion
fi


### Aliases to save time & typing: ###

alias ll="ls -lh"
alias la="ls -a"
alias exit="clear; exit"
alias x="startx"
alias h="htop"
alias a="alsamixer"
alias m="sudo mount -a"
alias fn="sudo mount freenas:/mnt/NAS-1 /mnt/storNAS-1"
alias uf="sudo umount freenas:/mnt/NAS-1"
alias pac="locate *.pac*"

# following is just for my memory regarding the wondrous dotpac :)
alias delete.pacsave="dotpac"


# Creates a list of all installed packages
alias pkglist="comm -13 <(pacman -Qmq | sort) <(pacman -Qqe | sort) > pkglist"

# Lets you search through all available packages simply using 'pacsearch packagename'
alias pacsearch="pacman -Sl | cut -d' ' -f2 | grep "

# sudo pacman -Syu by typing pSyu (sudo must be installed and configured first)
alias pSyu="sudo pacman -Syu"

# pacman -S by typing pS
alias pS="sudo pacman -S"

# pacman -Rsn ,which fully deletes packages - including dependencies & config files
alias pdelete="sudo pacman -Rsn"

# pacman -Sc ,deletes all but currently installed packages from /var/cache/pacman/pkg/
alias clearcache="sudo pacman -Sc"

# yaourt -Syu by typing yaur
alias yaur="sudo yaourt -Syu --aur"

# yaourt -S by typing yS
alias yS="sudo yaourt -S"

# yaourt -Rsn , which fully deletes packages - see above
alias ydelete="sudo yaourt -Rsn"

# colorized pacman output with pacs alias:
alias pacs="pacsearch"
pacsearch() {
echo -e "$(pacman -Ss "$@" | sed \
-e 's#^core/.*#\\033[1;31m&\\033[0;37m#g' \
-e 's#^extra/.*#\\033[0;32m&\\033[0;37m#g' \
-e 's#^community/.*#\\033[1;35m&\\033[0;37m#g' \
-e 's#^.*/.* [0-9].*#\\033[0;36m&\\033[0;37m#g' ) \
\033[0m"
}

[szymon_g]

Remember: using ubuntu I learned a bit about these processes/conf-files, but usually this stuff " just" works...using Arch I have to learn about them. Pretty okay , as that was the whole goal of my Arch experience.

and think how many things you could learn using LFS!
but does it mean that LFS would be good for everyday usage?

[Barrucadu]

and think how many things you could learn using LFS!
but does it mean that LFS would be good for everyday usage?

Yes, why not? Installing/upgrading software wouldn't really be much more of a pain than using any source based distro, which people already do, and beyond that, there's not going to be much that affects how nice to use it is.

[jocheem67]

and think how many things you could learn using LFS!
but does it mean that LFS would be good for everyday usage?

'Everyday usage' is something very personal...
Ans why not use a distro that, once setup right, works well? The caveat is only the setup.