Install Archlinux

Introduction

Arch Linux is a general purpose linux distribution that can be molded to do just about anything. It is fast, lightweight, flexible, and most of the parts under the hood are quite simple to understand and tweak, which can make it a good distro to “learn the ropes” on. We do not provide any configuration helper utilities (ie, you won’t find linuxconf in here) so you will quickly become very proficient at configuring your system from the shell commandline.

Arch Linux uses i686-optimized packages which gives us improved performance over some of our i386-optimized cousins. This means that Arch Linux will only run on a Pentium II processor or higher. We try to stay fairly bleeding edge, and typically have the latest stable versions of software.

Arch Linux uses the Pacman package manager, which couples a simple binary package format with an easy-to-use build system, allowing the users to easily manage and customize their packages, whether they be official Arch packages or the user’s own homegrown ones. The repository system allows users to build and maintain their own custom package repositories, which encourages community growth and contribution.

Pacman can keep a system up to date by synchronizing package lists with the master server, making it a breeze for the security-conscious system administrator to maintain. This server/client model also allows you to download/install packages with a simple command, complete with all required dependencies (similar to Debian’s apt-get).

Arch’s official package set is fairly streamlined, but we supplement this with a larger, more complete “extra” repository that contains a lot of the stuff that never made it into our core package set. This repository is constantly growing with the help of packages submitted from our strong community.

Arch Linux does not provide any official support, but you will find a lot of helpful people on our IRC channel and on our user forums. Chances are that some other Archer has had the same problem/question as you and it’s already been answered. Ask around!

Arch Linux uses a “rolling release” system which works like this: We have two versions of our core package set at any given time, Current and Release. The Current repository always contains the latest and greatest versions of packages. As soon as a package is updated it is part of the Current repository, so this is the one to follow if you want to stay very up to date. The Release repository follows the semi-regular snapshot releases and does not update until the next snapshot/iso has been released. For example, the Release repository will point to all packages on the 0.5 ISO until we release 0.6; then it will point to 0.6 packages until 0.7 is released. This is useful if you only want to update your system when a new release is available.

So, to sum up: Arch Linux is a workhorse distribution designed to fit the needs of the competent linux user. We strive to make it both powerful and easy to manage, making it an ideal distro for servers and workstations. Take it in any direction you like.

Getting Started

First you need to grab the latest version of Arch, This article was written when Arch 0.7.1 was released, so please go to official site and grab it from the download page, Please use torrent and if you can help everyone by seeding it… Now burn the iso on a cd (i don’t think i have to teach u how to do this) and let’s get started with it…

Booting Arch and Prepare for installation

Put the cd into your cd-rom drive and reboot your computer, be sure that your computer is set to boot from cd-rom first (refer to your motherboard/bios manual), when prompted to boot just press enter… After it boots you will find yourself on a console, so you are ready to begin installation.. NOTE: if you have another keyboard layout than Qwerty, you may type the command

km

to load the keyboard layout.. Now start installation by typing Code:

arch/setup

now you need to proceed into partitioning the hard disk, so choose the partitioning, choose manual if you want to partition it manually, otherwize you can choose automatic to erase the whole hard disk and partioning it automatically… If you choose manually, cfdisk will load, be sure you parition the hard disk in order to have 2 partition ready for use (one as / and another one as swap, you can make more if you want a seperated /home /boot etc…), the parition to use as / must be type 83 and swap must be type 82, when you are done with cfdisk, click on write table and then on quit.

Installing Base System

Now choose mounting file system, choose the partiton type 83 as /, and the one type 82 as swap, click on Select Packages and choose only base install. Arch will install base system now, after that install the kernel 2.6 now about bootloader, Actually the best one to use in my opinion is grub, but i will discuss here wether to install one or not, actually since the bootloader (Grub) of my Ubuntu Distribution is used to access the other Two Distribution, I dont install bootloader, instead i just boot ubuntu after installing Arch and add the grub entry of it to my ubuntu’s menu.lst, so if you would like to do like me here’s what to do: When you finish base install + kernel, then just quit Installation and reboot your PC by typing

reboot

Go to your ubuntu (or the other distro you have) edit your menu.lst ( sudo vi /boot/grub/menu.lst ) and add the below lines At the end of the file, I’ll suppose the partition Arch is on, is hda3 ( type fdisk -l /dev/hda ) to know which one it is exactly, then you need to tweak the lines below for your configuration, for example fro hda3 i use (hd0,2) and root=/dev/hda3, but for hdb4 for example you have to use (hd1,3) root=/dev/hdb3 (hdX,Y) will be: * X the number of the hard disk * Y the number of the partition

title Arch Linux root (hd0,2)
    kernel /boot/vmlinuz26 root=/dev/hda3 ro
    initrd /boot/initrd26.img

Now reboot your Ubuntu (ot whatever it is) and boot into Arch

NOTE: There’s something which have confused me, actually if you didn’t notice, the setup did not ask you to change the root password, but when you boot it the first time you will be asked for a login, actually login with root, it will not ask you for a password.

Getting Networking Up

I will cover in this section only Wired connection, actually you cant get wireless if you don’t have at least wired at the first steps (actually you can but i will not cover them)

Let’s check if your modules are loaded first, you can do that by typing

lsmod | grep "8139too"

If the modules are up, then check the state of eth0

ifconfig eth0

if you get some output than everything is ok, just need to get it up and running, so let’s edit first the rc.conf file

vi /etc/rc.conf

You will find something like

eth0="inet 192.168.0.2 etc..."

replace the whole line with

eth0="dhcp"

make sure the line that begins with INTERFACES look like

INTERFACES=(lo eth0)

That will give you internet when you reboot but to get internet right now you have to get it up then do the below two commands

/etc/rc.d/network restart

test if you have internet

ping google.com

if you have internet, then you are ready to proceed to the next step

Updating the System, Installing X, Gnome, gdm

I suppose that you already have Internet before beginning this step, if that’s the case then let’s get started by upgrading the system to the latest vesrion available

pacman -Syu

when that is done, let’s Install X and gnome

pacman -S xorg gdm gnome gnome-extra

The above command will install gnome, gdm and all other dependicy, the download can take a while, so go grub a coffe or something

NOTE: Do not reboot yet.

Configuring X

Lets start by configuring X, there’s actually Three methods to configure it

Configuring using xorgconfig

xorgconfig

and answer all the questions, it will create the xorg.conf for you

Configuring using hwd

There’s a tool called hwd which will actually configure xorg for you, but unlike xorgconfig you will not have any question to answer, though hwd will create xorg.conf.hwd afterwards so you need to manually copy it to xorg.conf so let’s first install it

pacman -S hwd

Run it

hwd -x

Copy the config file to the correct place

cp /etc/X11/xorg.conf.hwd /etc/X11/xorg.conf

NOTE: Dont forget to backup xorg.conf if you had one before running the above command.

Copying Ubuntu’s xorg.conf

This worked for me like a charm but i don’t guarentee that it will work for you, actually I use ubuntu’s xorg.conf, just copy it to /etc/X11

Don’t forget to test X server after configuring it!!

startx

to run X, to quit it just Press Ctrl + Alt + BackSpace

NOTE: Do not reboot yet.

Configuring gdm

Using rc.conf (recommended)

You must add gdm to your DAEMONS array in /etc/rc.conf

vi /etc/rc.conf

Look for the code that looks like

DAEMONS=(syslog-ng .... )

Add gdm to it

DAEMONS=(syslog-ng .... gdm)

Using inittab

Actually gdm dont need any configuration but i will tell you how to configure your system to run gdm, so you need to change the init startEdit the file /etc/inittab

vi /etc/inittab

Replace

id:3:initdefault:

With

id:5:initdefault:

and replace

x:5:respawn:/usr/X11R6/bin/xdm -nodaemon

With

x:5:respawn:/opt/gnome/sbin/gdm -nodaemon

NOTE: Do not reboot yet.

Add Another User

For sure you will not use root, you must create a new user, so lets do it, let’s create your group first

groupadd USERNAME

replace USERNAME with your username Launch adduser now

adduser

Fill your username with the same USERNAME value above, leave UID blank, put

USERNAME

for the initial group, fill Additional Groups with

users,wheel,audio

Leave all the rest to the default values except for you password…

NOTE: Do not reboot yet.

Making the audio work

The biggest problem i has is making the audio work, but actually repairing it was that easy, you must install alsa-lib alsa-utils and alsa-oss

pacman -S alsa-lib alsa-utils alsa-oss

You must be sure that you are within the audio group

groups USERNAME

If audio is not within the output then you need to run

gpasswd -a USERNAME audio

You need to enable alsa daemon

vi /etc/rc.conf

add

alsa

to

DAEMONS=( .... )

Where …. are some entries just add it at the end just before the last ), here’s a sample of the line below

DAEMONS=(syslog-ng !hotplug !pcmcia network netfs crond cpudyn acpid portmap alsa)

NOTE: You might not have the same line, i’m sure u dont have cpudyn, acpid not portmap in this line, but do not mind it actually all your interrest here is alsa

DAEMONS=(syslog-ng !hotplug !pcmcia network netfs crond cpudyn acpid portmap alsa)

NOTE: Do not reboot yet.

Setting up the hostname

You might want to change the hostname, so please open /etc/rc.conf

vi /etc/rc.conf

Replace myhost with YOURHOSTNAME, of course YOURHOSTNAME will be the hostname u want (alphanumerique)

HOSTNAME="myhost"

You must also (either if u changed the hostname or not) add the hostname to /etc/hosts, open /etc/hosts

vi /etc/hosts

Replace the Line

127.0.0.1               localhost.localdomain   localhost

With

127.0.0.1               localhost.localdomain   localhost YOURHOSTNAME

Otherwize gnome will have problems to open! Reboot After all what you have done above, finally you got a system up and running, all you need to do now is to reboot

reboot

Unmuting Sound

When you reboot you will notice that you don’t have sound yet, well actually you have but it’s just muted, so type the below commands

amixer set Master 75 unmute amixer set PCM 75 unmute

Now adjust the volume using the gnome-volume applet (beside the clock) and try playing a sound

Congratulations

If you achieved this step and no errors occured then Congratulations And Voilà, you are using your new Arch linux

Some Usefull Links

• Pacman
• Wireless Setup
• Install and Configure Xorg
• Gnome

P.S: This post has been salvaged from an old dead installation, Thanks to web-archive

23 September 2010 ·