A First Date With Arch Linux...

[Vagabond]

Rather than learn how to work yet another distro, I want to learn more about Linux. So I looked into, among others, Arch Linux. It's too early for me to review this distro, but I want to say a few words about its concept and the installation process I just completed (not including X, which may never get installed). The instructions are superb, and yes, it is a good learning experience. My biggest problem was with cfdisk, a tool I didn't know (fdisk is good enough) and which I cuss as downright deceitful; Arch itself is candid and smooth as silk. I'm not at all sure it is for "the competent Linux user" only, as it never puzzled me. Everything is crystal clear and rational, and the install was the easiest in my limited experience. IMHO I now have a perfect complement for my Debian Stable, because Arch is a self-proclaimed "bleeding edge" distro. (The last line in one of the two install guides reads, "...type reboot at the command line and cross your fingers!" LOL) I'm very impressed by the "rolling-release" concept and the respect for users that underlies the Arch philosophy. So far, highest recommendation. You might want to take a look. Thanks go to Josh and others here who let me know Arch Linux exists!

[Guest LilBambi]

Awesome Vagabond!

[amenditman]

Congrats on a fresh Arch install.No, it's not hard, it just takes someone with an adventurous spirit to give it a go. It seems much more complicated before starting than after finishing.

[SueD]

If I can use it, anyone can use it.

[securitybreach]

I am glad you like it. Now you see why it has become my favorite distro of all. As far as running without X, if I could get tty to work with dual monitors, I would probably rarely boot into X either. I know there has to be a way have tty1 on one monitor and tty2 on the other.

[Wamukota]

I am interested in trying Arch also. Just a simple one:Which one is better? The Netinstall image or the Core imageI have broadband and unlimited D/L so that will not be a problem.

[amenditman]

NetInstall was very easy and quick for me, a first timer.Just had securitybreach's How-to open and followed it, referred to the official ArchWiki a few times also.Great documentation.

[securitybreach]

I would go with the Core version. I have never tried the netinstall iso since the Core is only around 300mb. Either one should be fine but I only have experience with the Core version. Installing Arch is a little confusing the first time, so you may want to take a look at the installation guides:My tutorial: http://forums.scotsnewsletter.com/index.php?showtopic=27596Archwiki Beginner's Guide: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginner%27s_Guide

[Vagabond]

Adventures with Arch continue...this distro has so many elegant features that it's a real delight. Everybody ought to have a look. I'd like to have a few more apps in the repos, such as my beloved xemacs21-nomule, but I'll survive without it (no, I think I'll skip compiling from source, as the many dependencies are also unknown to Arch; infinite regression looms, so I'll limp along with Emacs, heh). Meanwhile maybe you Arch gurus can tell me how to set up /etc/resolv.conf so it stays put. Blank just won't work (which only seems logical!). Give me a sample entry, please, and I'll insert my ISP's URL and IP address. Yes, I can look it up, but it's more fun posting here. TIA!

[securitybreach]

Adventures with Arch continue...this distro has so many elegant features that it's a real delight. Everybody ought to have a look. I'd like to have a few more apps in the repos, such as my beloved xemacs21-nomule, but I'll survive without it (no, I think I'll skip compiling from source, as the many dependencies are also unknown to Arch; infinite regression looms, so I'll limp along with Emacs, heh). Meanwhile maybe you Arch gurus can tell me how to set up /etc/resolv.conf so it stays put. Blank just won't work (which only seems logical!). Give me a sample entry, please, and I'll insert my ISP's URL and IP address. Yes, I can look it up, but it's more fun posting here. TIA!

Are using a router? If so yours should looks like this:

╔═ comhack@Venus 12:50 AM ╚═══ ~-> cat /etc/resolv.conf # Generated by dhcpcd# /etc/resolv.conf.head can replace this linedomain Baphometnameserver 192.168.1.1 # /etc/resolv.conf.tail can replace this line

replacing Baphomet with your router's name. Here is the Archwiki entry for /etc/resolv.conf: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Resolv.conf Check out my thread where I was having problems with resolv.conf http://forums.scotsnewsletter.com/index.ph...solv\.confAlso, there are a few xemacs packages available in the repositories:

╔═ comhack@Venus 12:50 AM ╚═══ ~-> yaourt -Ss xemacsextra/xemacs 21.5.29-2	highly customizable open source text editor and application development system forked from GNU Emacsextra/xemacs-base 2.19-1	Fundamental XEmacs support, you almost certainly need thisextra/xemacs-sumo 20090217-1	XEmacs Packagescommunity/xemacs-all-packages 20090916-1	all packages from xemacs.org

It looks as the xemacs-all-packages package contain the mule flag or whatever it is:http://gudrun.archlinux.org/packages/commu...packages/files/

[Wamukota]

Well, it took me about 45 minutes to install Arch + Gnome using the netinstall. But now I am lost.Ok, Gnome is running, but I haven't a clue how to install my printer. Audio isn't working in Gnome - seems to be muted or so, because when I open my speakers 100% I do hear a faint something. Strange.I haven't found a way to install additional software, other that guesswork on how the correct program name is, and then installing it using pacman. You cannot expect me to remember all the correct names of the programs. Firefox I know, but how is the name of the twitter client I used? Can't remember. How do you see a list of those? So I must be missing something, or I haven't found it yet in the - very well written - wikis.For instance

# pacman -Ss vlc

Doesn't show any of the plugins like vlc-plugin-jack, only vlc and vlc-plugin (the Mozilla browser plugin). Still much to explore at first sight, and not what I expected. I expected the Arch part to be much more difficult to install and then to have a DE with everything i'm used from Mint, PCLinuxOS, Fedora, ... but it is the other way round.But anyhow, it was fun installing Arch, not so simple to configure Gnome.

[securitybreach]

Did you follow my tutorial? I explained how to setup all codecs and alsa:

To install all codecs and some useful apps:# pacman -S gstreamer0.10-{base,good,bad,ugly}-plugins gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg openoffice-base leafpad thunar mousepad xscreensaver firefox vlc mplayer-plugin mplayer alsa-utils j2re flashplugin mplayer mplayer-plugin libdvdcss k3b dvd_rw-tool

After rebooting, log back in as root. Next you will need to setup a user account. Replacing username with your desired username:

# useradd -m -G users,audio,lp,optical,storage,video,wheel,power -s  /bin/bash username

then to set the password type:

# passwd  username

This will set up your user account and password.Next we need to install alsa to get sound. To do this as root:

pacman  -S alsa-utils

To test sound type

#aplay  /usr/share/sounds/alsa/Front_Center.wav

If you hear sound, you are good to go. Also, add alsa to your DAEMONS section in /etc/rc.conf to automatically restore the mixer settings on boot-up.

http://forums.scotsnewsletter.com/index.php?showtopic=27596Also, what is your printer model? http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/CUPS

[Wamukota]

Audio is now OK. I did not install the correct codecs. My bad.What tool do you use to replace synaptic to have a visual overview of installable packages?

[Vagabond]

Josh, I'll have a look at those Xemacs packages, thanks. Not sure why they did not show up when I told pacman to look; I am not handy with that tool yet. Mule works fine, but it is a bit bulky, is all. I really like the Xemacs fork.Meanwhile I tacked a line "nohook resolv.conf" on the end of /etc/dhcpcd.conf to try to keep /etc/resolv.conf from being over-written (which kills the daylights out of my network connection), and so far, it's holding. But the proof of the eating is in the pudding, or the gift horse has bad teeth, or however the expression goes. We'll see. The rest of it is going very well. Arch is friendly and polite.

[securitybreach]

I personally do not use any frontends(gui) for pacman but here are some frontends: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Pacman_GUI_FrontendsThis may also help with common applications: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Common_Applications and http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Lightweight_ApplicationsALso, you mentioned twitter, just search with yaourt/pacman:

╔═ comhack@Venus 02:32 AM ╚═══ ~-> yaourt -Ss twittercommunity/choqok 0.9.55-1	A Twitter/identi.ca/laconica client for KDEcommunity/microblog-purple 0.3.0-1	Libpurple plug-in supporting microblog services like Twittercommunity/mitter 0.4.5-2	A PyGTK/console client for Twitteraur/bashtc 0.6.1-3 (11)	A Twitter client for the command line on GNU/Linux operating systems.aur/bti 025-1 (29)	Console client for Twitter and identi.caaur/bti-git 20090610-3 (7)	Console client for Twitter and identi.caaur/buzzbird 0.7-3 (9)	A XULRunner based Twitter clientaur/buzzbird-git 20100326-1 (9)	A XULRunner based Twitter client. GIT-Versionaur/choqok-svn 1151294-1 (58)	A Twitter/identi.ca/laconica client for KDE 4.aur/cltw 1.1.4-1 (1)	Command line Twitter utilityaur/cltwitter-git 20100214-1 (1)	Command-line utility for posting updates to Twitter, written in C.aur/conkytwitter 0.1-4 (Out of Date) (9)	Little python script to get your twitter timeline and put in your desktop using conkyaur/destroytwitter 2.0.2-1 (45)	DestroyTwitter is kinda like TweetDeck but more lightweight...aur/dtwitzen 0.2-1 (0)	A compact twitter client for dzen.aur/frogmicroblog 0.1.4-3 (12)	twitter identi.ca client.aur/gtktwitter-git 20090505-1 (17)	A lightweight Twitter client for Linux written in GTKaur/gtwitter 1.0-3 (45)	A Linux client for reading and posting to twitter.com web service.aur/hackage2twitter 0.2.1-2 (0)	Send new Hackage releases to Twitteraur/haskell-feed2twitter 0.2.0-2 (0)	Send posts from a feed to Twitteraur/haskell-hs-twitter 0.2.8-1 (2)	Haskell binding to the Twitter APIaur/histwi 0.5.3-1 (1)	Histwi is linux desktop program for Twitter account management.aur/joost 0-1 (1)	A media player with twitter rolled in oneaur/jtwitter 1.3-1 (0)	A small java library providing easy access to the Twitter APIaur/libpurple-twitter-protocol 0.1.3-1 (Out of Date) (14)	A libpurple plugin which treats Twitter as a full blown IM protocol.aur/mbpurple-svn 369-3 (6)	Libpurple (Pidgin) plug-in supporting microblog services like Twitteraur/mojito 0.21.1-1 (0)	A social store, which will fetch and store data from the social web (twitter, flickr, myspace, facebook, etc.)aur/mpd-twitter 0.1-4 (6)	Publish on twitter what you are listening on MPDaur/mxit-libpurple 2.0.0-1 (Out of Date) (15)	Libpurple plug-in supporting microblog services like Twitteraur/nikepub 1.1.2-2 (0)	Command line utility publishes Nike+ runs on blogs and Twitteraur/passerd-git 20100503-1 (0)	Twitter client works like ircd serveraur/perl-net-twitter 2.12-1 (Out of Date) (7)	'Perl interface to twitter.com'aur/perl-net-twitter-lite 0.08006-1 (0)	A perl interface to the Twitter APIaur/pidgin-twitter 0.9.1-1 (139)	Pidgin plugin for Twitter supportaur/pino 0.2.11-1 (197)	Fast, easy and free Twitter clientaur/pino-twitter-hg 180-1 (25)	Mercurial build of Pino Twitter Client GTK2/Valaaur/posty 1.8.2-1 (4)	Adobe AIR twitter/ident.ca clientaur/prpltwtr 0.5.2-1 (16)	A libpurple (Pidgin, Finch, Empathy* etc) plugin which treats microblogging (Twitter, identi.ca, status.net, etc) as IM protocols.aur/python-identica 0.6-2 (5)	an ugly hack to use python-twitter lib for identi.ca. just use the same twitter functions and they will be sent to identi.ca/api instead of twitter.comaur/python-twitter 0.6-1 (79)	A python wrapper around the Twitter APIaur/python-twitter-svn-compatible 176-1 (0)	A python wrapper around the Twitter API. Patched to work with Twitter compatible servicesaur/qtwitlib-svn 67-1 (1)	C++ Library for the twitter.com APIaur/qtwitter 0.10.0-1 (27)	A simple Qt application for interacting with the Twitter social network.aur/qutim-protocol-twitter-svn 4-5 (10)	Adds support for the Twitter protocol to Qutim. SVN versionaur/qwit 0.10-1 (89)	Qt4 cross-platform client for Twitteraur/qwit-beta 1.1-1 (8)	Qt4 cross-platform client for Twitteraur/qwit-ng 213-1 (Out of Date) (1)	Qt4 cross-platform client for Twitter - branch is the most atual with new featuresaur/qwit-svn 346-1 (32)	Qt4 cross-platform client for Twitter (SVN snapshots)aur/qwit-tosate-svn 253-1 (4)	Qt4 cross-platform client for Twitter; tosate branch with followers managementaur/qwitik 0.1.2-1 (3)	Cross-platform client for twitter.comaur/rss-torrent 0.7.1-1 (1)	A broadcatching application that watches RSS feeds of Twitter timelines with the ability to filter and download torrents.aur/seesmic-desktop 0.7-1 (45)	Get live updates from your friends on Twitter and Facebook.aur/sharefire 1.8-1 (12)	News aggregator that lets you share stories via AIM,Facebook,Myspace,Twitter, email and moreaur/snitter 0.028-1 (10)	Twitter application using adobe-airaur/spazair 0.8.3-1 (Out of Date) (17)	Twitter Client powered by Adobe AIRaur/sweetgtk-bzr latest-1 (Out of Date) (5)	A microblogging Sweetter/Twitter clientaur/tircd 0.7-1 (Out of Date) (9)	An ircd proxy to the twitter API.aur/ttytter 1.1.02-1 (28)	A multi-functional, command-line twitter clientaur/turpial 1.3.3-2 (20)	A multi-interface Twitter client written in Python.aur/turpial-git 20100420-1 (17)	A multi-interface Twitter client written in Python.aur/tweepy-git 20100216-1 (5)	Twitter api library for python edit.aur/tweet-git 20080624-1 (Out of Date) (2)	A GNOME Twitter client using OpenGL with Clutteraur/tweetdeck 0_34.3-1 (155)	TweetDeck is an Adobe Air desktop application for twitter that looks to capture the abundance of social media and display it in a unique columned user interface.aur/tweeter 1-1 (10)	A small Perl script for updating your twitter statusaur/tweetr 3v4-1 (4)	Tweetr is a lightweight Twitter client with direct webcam access.aur/twhirl 0.9.4-1 (64)	twhirl is a social software desktop client, based on the Adobe AIR platform. Connects to multiple Twitter, laconi.ca, identi.ca, Friendfeed and Seesmic accountsaur/twibble 0.5.1-1 (4)	Twitter client using Adobe AIRaur/twidge 0.99.3-2 (Out of Date) (28)	Unix Command-Line Twitter and Identica Clientaur/twitdocdesktop 0.8-1 (1)	App to share your documents on twitter easilyaur/twitgin-git 20091015-1 (2)	Change Pidgin's status message. Status message is taken from a Twitter's blogaur/twitter 0.1.1-2 (12)	A Haskell-based CLI Twitter clientaur/twitter-glib 0.9.6-1 (3)	A GObject-based C wrapper library around the (almost-) RESTful web API provided by Twitteraur/twitter-gx 1.1-2 (5)	A simple script to submit Twitter tweets from the command line or a zenity dialogaur/twitter4j 2.1.3-1 (0)	A Java library for TwitterAPIaur/twitterlocal 2.0.1-2 (4)	The TwitterLocal AIR Client allows you to watch as many location-based Twitter feeds as you want.aur/twittero-hg 0.1-1 (Out of Date) (3)	Twittero is a simple and powerful Twitter client for the POSIX terminalaur/twitturse 0.1.1-1 (4)	An ncurses client, writter in C for Twitteraur/twitty-twister-git 20091101-1 (2)	A twisted client for twitter-like APIs.aur/twitux 0.69-5 (158)	A Twitter client for the Gnome desktop.aur/twyt 0.9.2-2 (10)	Twyt is a  Twitter API interface for Pythonaur/xtwitter 0.8-1 (16)	A very tiny twitter client for Xaur/yasst 20100427-5 (4)	A lightweight multiplatform twitter thingymbob, created with Qt frameworkaur/zentwitter 1-2 (5)	A small bash script to update your Twitter status

http://archlinux.fr/yaourt-enor here to make it easier: http://aur.archlinux.org/packages.php?O=0&...mp;do_Search=GoTo use the packages from AUR, you must install/setup yaourt. The syntax is the same as pacman. Also look here: http://archlinux.fr/yaourt-en

[Urmas]

Like... this?(Josh is going to throw a hissy fit when he sees this, but... what can I say? I'm the GUI Penguin – I'm entitled.) Pacman GUI FrontendsAs for Yaourt... dunno... a spoon? EDIT: Oopsie... Josh was quicker...

[securitybreach]

Like... this?(Josh is going to throw a hissy fit when he sees this, but... what can I say? I'm the GUI Penguin – I'm entitled.)

I always say "use whatever tool works best for you". I personally think a frontend is just added bloat but what do I know. :hysterical:Side note: You should look at the wiki page for pacman. Pacman is a very powerful package manager and there are built in ways to search for packages and other neat things. Once you learn the syntax, it is so much quicker than any frontend: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Pacman#Usage

[securitybreach]

Just thought I would add part of the Archlinux philosophy:

Simplicity is absolutely the principal objective behind Arch development. Many GNU/Linux distributions define themselves as "simple." However, simplicity itself has many definitions.Arch Linux defines simplicity as without unnecessary additions, modifications, or complications, and provides a lightweight UNIX-like base structure that allows an individual user to shape the system according to their own needs. In short: an elegant, minimalist approach.A lightweight base structure built with high programming standards will tend to have lower system resource demands. The base system is devoid of all clutter that may obscure important parts of the system, or make access to them difficult or convoluted. It has a streamlined set of succinctly commented, clean configuration files that are arranged for quick access and editing, with no cumbersome graphical configuration tools to hide possibilities from the user. An Arch Linux system is therefore readily configurable to the very last detail.

http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/The_Arch_Way

[securitybreach]

Urmas, that frontend you posted has some major issues:

WARNING: This program installs and removes software packages with the -d switch, meaning it does NOT check for dependencies. Using this program can put you at risk for breaking your system. --Falcata 12:35, 29 May 2010 (EDT)

If you need a frontend for pacman I would not use gtkpacman since it does not do dependencies: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Pacman...tends#GtkPacmanShaman is the most popular and suggested frontend right now.

[Urmas]

... since it does not do dependencies...

Aa-ha... rather useless, then.

Shaman is the most popular and suggested frontend right now.

You're da sha-man!

[securitybreach]

You're da sha-man!

I do what I can

[securitybreach]

Its 3:30am here, gonna crash in a half hour. Will be around all day/night tomorrow though since I am off work.

[securitybreach]

Also, I noticed you mentioned the vlc-plugin for firefox Wamukota:

╔═ comhack@Venus 03:25 AM ╚═══ ~-> pacman -Ss vlc-pluginextra/vlc-plugin 1.1.1-3	VLC mozilla browser plugin

[Wamukota]

Not so easy to enable USB printer detection. Working on it.This is what I don't understand. Some basic stuff requires quite a lot of tweaking. Detecting a USB printer is not something new, so why is it so difficult? USB Webcam is working, USB thumbdrive is detected, but my Samsung Laser on USB is not.I blacklisted usblp and will try again

[securitybreach]

Josh, I'll have a look at those Xemacs packages, thanks. Not sure why they did not show up when I told pacman to look; I am not handy with that tool yet. Mule works fine, but it is a bit bulky, is all. I really like the Xemacs fork.Meanwhile I tacked a line "nohook resolv.conf" on the end of /etc/dhcpcd.conf to try to keep /etc/resolv.conf from being over-written (which kills the daylights out of my network connection), and so far, it's holding. But the proof of the eating is in the pudding, or the gift horse has bad teeth, or however the expression goes. We'll see. The rest of it is going very well. Arch is friendly and polite.

Sorry I overlooked the post(must be late). Anyway, I am glad you got resolv.conf working right. If you have anymore issues, just post them and I will try my best to help you out. Also, is the xemacs package in the repositories the one you were looking for? Sorry I am vim kind of guy myself.

[Wamukota]

OK. is now detected. Man man man ... it is a real rollercoaster to get it running.

[securitybreach]

As far as the printer, if it is a popular brand like HP, then it is fairly easy to setup. If you could, post the specs/model of your printer and I will find the answer for you in the morning. Most every type of hardware has been documented in Archlinux. It is just a matter of finding the right wiki entry/forum post. Good night for now.

[Vagabond]

Anyway, I am glad you got resolv.conf working right.

Thanks... the jury is out on whether I did any good....a reboot produced a network FAIL again, and when I looked at resolv.conf, expecting to find it over-written, it was not! Don't know why the network failed, did not know that it did when it did -- the LEDs on the router did not indicate anything. I guess it was just my ISP messing with me yet again. I'll take it one boot at a time. Meanwhile I changed the prompts for root and user so they show the absolute path to the PWD, and got rid of the []. Cleaner, more informative. I will check out those Xemacs apps in a day or two and report back. I appreciate your thoughtfulness and patience. --Eventually I'll want to know what magic can you work for wodim and genisoimage. I don't see them in Arch, either. And I'll probably be pestering you for help getting my printer integrated into the system without using X (Kyocera, I have the driver for it). No hurry. -- Yeah, the lighter text editors are a lot more popular than huge old Emacs, but it's like swimming in a deep lake: you use only the top two feet of the water. I hardly know Emacs at all.Edited Edited July 25, 2010 by Vagabond

[Guest LilBambi]

Looks like you are having some fun! :thumbsup:Awesome!

[Vagabond]

Looks like you are having some fun! :thumbsup:Awesome!

Oh, boy, you hit the nail on the head! This Arch Linux is great, and I'm learning all sorts of stuff and the satisfaction of solving problems is tremendous. I feel sorry for Windows users -- I don't call paying for software fun, and in my limited experience, "fixing Windows" is almost an oxymoron. Well, some of the money spent on Redmond's offerings goes to support Billy's charity work. We should look on the bright side, eh?