Originally posted by chromer
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Arch Linux's Install Media Adds "Archinstall" For Quick/Easy Installations
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Originally posted by Old Grouch View Post
I have not tried Arch yet, but you are saying the right things to make me think it is an option. With 'a bit' of finagling I set up my personal Lubuntu* system fully encrypted with a non-mainstream filesystems, but standard installers make this unnecessarily complicated, so if it is easier on Arch, I may well be persuaded to move to it.
*I used Debian from version 2.0 (Hamm), but got fed up setting up DEs, WMs etc, and went for the ease of a pre-packaged distribution that was 'minimal-enough' (LXDE). While I enjoy fiddling with stuff, being forced to audit config changes on upgrades gets rapidly irritating**, so I chose to let someone else do all the boring integration work for me. Hence Lubuntu, which has since 'jumped the shark', so I'm on the hunt for a grown-up distribution that 'just works' in a sane manner.
**I suspect Arch does just this, which is fine when you are learning, but gets really, really irritating when you are using your workstation as a tool for getting non-Linux things done.When you are in the middle of an update, and a breaking change in a config is presented as a diff with the option of using a cli/non-gui text editor to make fundamental changes, shorn of context, I get...irritated. It would be nice to have a dry-run/preprocessor that would detect if config changes were necessary and flag them up to allow me to research them beforehand. In principle, I just need to set an LVM checkpoint, run an upgrade and revert back if a breaking change occurs. Which is a bit of a faff - but maybe I'll start doing just that...
As an example, Arch does not forcefully present changes to conf files as a diff in the middle of an update. Instead it simply keeps the existing file (so everything keeps running in exactly the same way as before the update, even if you reboot) and saves the new file with a .pacnew extension (e.g. sshd.conf.pacnew) and then leaves it up to the user to go look for these new files and do whatever they want with them. No preprocessors. But here's the trick: it's actually really easy to write a so-called pacman hook, that will be called after each update and notify you about any new .pacnew files that have been created - and that's that. Or of course you could write yourself a cron task (or systemd-timer service) that does the same thing every X amount of time.
Can we do that in other Linux distros? Of course we can. But do we usually do it? No, because we're used to convoluted, fully automated packaging tools like apt that we really don't want to mess around with because we're afraid (and rightly so) that we'll probably break them.
Regarding simplicity, speaking for myself, I fell in love with Arch way back when because it showed me a simple truth: a complete Linux setup is as simple as partition disks, format disks, mount disks, install base packages, configure basic stuff like fstab/timezone/locales, configure network, optionally install GUI, enable services/init scripts, reboot, done*. Depending on your internet connection speed, you can literally have a brand new Arch system up and running in less than 10 minutes. And afterwards, it's a quick trip to the Arch Wiki (which let's not forget, it's the #1 go-to place for learning how to do stuff on any Linux system) to find out how to configure non-basic stuff like e.g. disk decryption on boot.
(*Terribly sorry if I'm forgetting a step or two, it's been ages since I last installed Arch).
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Originally posted by Mike Frett View Post
For now. This is all I heard when I used Windows. Don't like it? Keep using the current version. Sorry but it doesn't work that way in real life. Support ends and what you hate becomes the only option. You have no choice.
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The best thing about this installer is not needing a second PC to look at the wiki.
Have seen a video where this installer only created 2 partitions: EFI and / with btrfs.
So the question is, can I also create a swap, a /home partition with XFS and do the btrfs snapshots really work without subvolumes?Last edited by Firnefex; 05 April 2021, 07:47 AM.
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Originally posted by Mez' View PostAre there big fundamental differences between Arch and Manjaro or EndeavourOS once the system has been installed?
On a day-to-day basis, regarding pacman and pacman-mirrors, pamac, yay, the AUR, etc...
Let's say I decide to switch from Manjaro and I'm already familiar with these. Would I really see a big difference in maintaining the distro once it's set up?
And before that, could you give me some benefits that would be killer enough for me to switch (and keep using the same tools as they work very well for me)? In other words, what makes Arch worth using beside its tailored installer?
Been awhile since I've used anything on the EndeavourOS side, but back when I used Antergos their updates would lag behind Arch by a day or so which occasionally led to package version issues. The same thing can happen on Arch when enough user repos are added. It's just the nature of rolling and diverging from upstream. While I'm not sure how much of an issue that is with Endeavour, it is something to keep in mind if you're the kind of person that updates often and you've strayed from only Arch (and the AUR) in your mirrorlist.
On-topic, I'm surprised at the negativity here. I thought more people would be happy about both an official method to script an Arch install around and a way to introduce it to the masses. IMHO, the most difficult part of any OS install is disk management so being able to simplify that process to make the overall OS accessible to everyone is a good thing. That doesn't apply to us or most posters here, but we're too smart for our own goods and we forget that.
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Originally posted by skeevy420 View PostOn-topic, I'm surprised at the negativity here. I thought more people would be happy about both an official method to script an Arch install around and a way to introduce it to the masses. IMHO, the most difficult part of any OS install is disk management so being able to simplify that process to make the overall OS accessible to everyone is a good thing. That doesn't apply to us or most posters here, but we're too smart for our own goods and we forget that.
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Originally posted by Nocifer View Post
The beauty of Arch IMHO is that it's one of those distros that encourages you to do those little things that could also be done in every other Linux distro, but that are usually not done because GUI tools have taken over and made us scared of manually changing conf files, reducing our systems into opaquely black boxes that mystify the user instead of empowering them to tinker with them.
As an example, Arch does not forcefully present changes to conf files as a diff in the middle of an update. Instead it simply keeps the existing file (so everything keeps running in exactly the same way as before the update, even if you reboot) and saves the new file with a .pacnew extension (e.g. sshd.conf.pacnew) and then leaves it up to the user to go look for these new files and do whatever they want with them. No preprocessors. But here's the trick: it's actually really easy to write a so-called pacman hook, that will be called after each update and notify you about any new .pacnew files that have been created - and that's that. Or of course you could write yourself a cron task (or systemd-timer service) that does the same thing every X amount of time.
Can we do that in other Linux distros? Of course we can. But do we usually do it? No, because we're used to convoluted, fully automated packaging tools like apt that we really don't want to mess around with because we're afraid (and rightly so) that we'll probably break them.
Regarding simplicity, speaking for myself, I fell in love with Arch way back when because it showed me a simple truth: a complete Linux setup is as simple as partition disks, format disks, mount disks, install base packages, configure basic stuff like fstab/timezone/locales, configure network, optionally install GUI, enable services/init scripts, reboot, done*. Depending on your internet connection speed, you can literally have a brand new Arch system up and running in less than 10 minutes. And afterwards, it's a quick trip to the Arch Wiki (which let's not forget, it's the #1 go-to place for learning how to do stuff on any Linux system) to find out how to configure non-basic stuff like e.g. disk decryption on boot.
(*Terribly sorry if I'm forgetting a step or two, it's been ages since I last installed Arch).
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Originally posted by TemplarGR View Post
I agree with this. That is why sometimes i use a live usb from another distro, for example Ubuntu or gparted, to partition a disk to my liking, before booting the arch installation usb. Having a gui is more comfortable when working with multiple partitions/disks and sadly if you are not careful partitioning tools from the terminal can be fatal to your data.
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Originally posted by TemplarGR View Post
I agree with this. That is why sometimes i use a live usb from another distro, for example Ubuntu or gparted, to partition a disk to my liking, before booting the arch installation usb. Having a gui is more comfortable when working with multiple partitions/disks and sadly if you are not careful partitioning tools from the terminal can be fatal to your data.
Originally posted by skeevy420 View Post
While I agree with all of that, I did have a good laugh at as simple as these 11 steps which require a fair amount of general Linux and PC knowledge.
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