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On switching to Arch Linux

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Re: On switching to Arch Linux

#121

Post by ff0066mote »

sliverstorm wrote: post #96
agentultra wrote: post #36

I've been using Arch for about three years now and can't imagine using another distro. The install phase is a pain if you want to get a full-blown plug-and-play ready-to-go desktop experience that rivals Ubuntu, OS X, or Windows. It's actually really easy if you just want a bare-bones system that boots into a shell and doesn't install any packages other than what it needs to do just that. Switch to Arch if you're a m…

Then why Arch and not Slackware?

It's not a big thing, but it was enough for me to stay with Arch:

Slackware's package management tools doesn't do dependencies. In Arch you can easily remove a package and everything that is no longer required.

pacman -Rsn package-to-remove

Re: On switching to Arch Linux

#122

Post by throwaway64 »

elasticdog wrote: post #106
acabal wrote: post #95

I wanted to try Arch to see what the fuss was about after I got badly burned by the Ubuntu 11.10 upgrade. I'm not a Linux newbie by any stretch and I managed to get it set up in a virtual machine, but when it came time to install the community package installer, I just couldn't do it. I was no doubt doing something stupid. But after fiddling with it for half an hour, I sat back and said to myself, "If I can't even in…

I'm curious what you mean by "community package installer"? If you're referring to Yaourt, that is an unofficial, third-party wrapper script that is unsupported by the Arch Linux developers and isn't required by any means. It does add some convenience for building packages from the AUR (Arch User Repository), but it's much safer to actually examine those PKGBUILDs to make sure they're sane. You also shouldn't need it…

Just a note, yaourt asks you if you want to examine and edit PKGBUILDs builds every time it builds a package, I really fail to see what the advantage of doing all the steps manually is.

Re: On switching to Arch Linux

#123

Post by pimeys »

agentultra wrote: post #36

I've been using Arch for about three years now and can't imagine using another distro. The install phase is a pain if you want to get a full-blown plug-and-play ready-to-go desktop experience that rivals Ubuntu, OS X, or Windows. It's actually really easy if you just want a bare-bones system that boots into a shell and doesn't install any packages other than what it needs to do just that. Switch to Arch if you're a m…

I've also used Arch for half a year now. I just installed it to boot me to the console, set a simple .xinitrc to open me a xmonad session, cloned my configs and I was ready to go. Fast, minimal and no distractions. That's what I want from my work computer.

Re: On switching to Arch Linux

#124

Post by throwaway64 »

shaurz wrote: post #64
pnathan wrote: post #27

I read the article and groaned. My days of "tweak it until it works, just for fun" are pretty much past me (I'm typing this on a Mac, for instance). I like to spend my energy creating things these days. But Arch seems really cool if you want to rebuild Linux systems for fun & knowledge!

Once you have Arch set up, there is very little tweaking that needs to be done. It "just works", well unless you have an AMD or NVIDIA graphics card and a new kernel or xorg comes out which isn't supported yet...

nouveau and the open source ATI radeon drivers work quite well on hardware that isn't the latest generation, and do not result in those sorts of issues.

Re: On switching to Arch Linux

#125

Post by anon_d »

zalew wrote: post #115
acabal wrote: post #95

I wanted to try Arch to see what the fuss was about after I got badly burned by the Ubuntu 11.10 upgrade. I'm not a Linux newbie by any stretch and I managed to get it set up in a virtual machine, but when it came time to install the community package installer, I just couldn't do it. I was no doubt doing something stupid. But after fiddling with it for half an hour, I sat back and said to myself, "If I can't even in…

Once ago, I spent a few hours during the night installing Arch, painfully managed to set most of stuff working and then... formatted it the hell out. Just as you say, my computer and my OS are my tools too, and tools only. I need to get my shit done, not spend all days long quircking every basic detail just to make it work. Even if my disk crashes I can set up a fully configured and working Debian with all most neede…

Even if my disk crashes I can set up a fully configured and working Debian with all most needed software, repos downloaded and ready to do real work in one hour flat.

I can do this with Arch Linux. I can't imagine what you could've had so much trouble with.

Re: On switching to Arch Linux

#126

Post by pm90 »

babarock wrote: post #83
pnathan wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure. But unless you're deploying custom Linux builds, what does that get you, exactly? I have a number of packages on my computer I don't use, and I am not being hindered by their existence. I instead use my brain cycles for creating new software & systems, not retooling the existing one to no end. edit: Please understand that I'm not saying a fully customizable Linux doesn't have its place. It absolutely does. But…

Although I wouldn't word it so aggressively, I too feel compelled to react to your "creating thing" idea. Dismissing OS customization as something that "gets in the way" is a terrible misunderstanding of the role of an OS in "cranking stuff out". The truth is, good configuration of the OS can save you huge amounts of time in your creating "new software & system time". The truth is, the OS is not supposed to be a blac…

you make excellent points, but that still doesn't answer pnathan's problem. He just wants to get his work done, and he's getting just that with a Mac. Maybe he would not like to invest time in configuring his OS, that's a personal decision. Yes, OS customization may be an interesting/exhilarating experience for you, but maybe not for him; that's how its "getting in the way", for him

Re: On switching to Arch Linux

#127

Post by niels_olson »

anon_d wrote: post #125
zalew wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once ago, I spent a few hours during the night installing Arch, painfully managed to set most of stuff working and then... formatted it the hell out. Just as you say, my computer and my OS are my tools too, and tools only. I need to get my shit done, not spend all days long quircking every basic detail just to make it work. Even if my disk crashes I can set up a fully configured and working Debian with all most neede…

Even if my disk crashes I can set up a fully configured and working Debian with all most needed software, repos downloaded and ready to do real work in one hour flat. I can do this with Arch Linux. I can't imagine what you could've had so much trouble with.

Welcome to HN. I see you've been here for a couple of months. Please review the guidelines. http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: On switching to Arch Linux

#128

Post by derleth »

agentultra wrote: post #71
astrodust wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you want to be a minimalist? Even a Raspberry Pi system, which costs under $50 kitted out with storage, could handle a moderately full install. The only "minimalist" Linux install I've ever wanted was one so stripped down it would boot off of a 3.5" floppy. It's amazing what you can do with a kernel, a baked in read-only filesystem and a tiny loopback device for storing configuration files.

Why would you want to be a minimalist? Less is more. My Arch system doesn't inundate me with pop-ups to update my system with out-of-date libraries. It doesn't integrate "the social web" into my "desktop." In fact it doesn't do anything unless I specifically want it to. Some people are happy with everything and the kitchen sink. I don't need all of that, so why have it? It takes up resources, clutters my space, requi…

> My Arch system doesn't inundate me with pop-ups to update my system with out-of-date libraries. It doesn't integrate "the social web" into my "desktop." In fact it doesn't do anything unless I specifically want it to.

All these things are also true with Ubuntu.

Re: On switching to Arch Linux

#129

Post by navs »

I've been using Arch on my little Samsung N150 for a while now. Initial setup was tedious but not altogether difficult thanks to their brilliant wiki. I'm no guru and I'm sure If I looked hard enough I could find excellent documentation on Ubuntu. I don't have to look far for Arch, a simple google nets me their wiki page as a top result and it's almost always able to fix any current problem.

Re: On switching to Arch Linux

#130

Post by SkyMarshal »

agentultra wrote: post #36

I've been using Arch for about three years now and can't imagine using another distro. The install phase is a pain if you want to get a full-blown plug-and-play ready-to-go desktop experience that rivals Ubuntu, OS X, or Windows. It's actually really easy if you just want a bare-bones system that boots into a shell and doesn't install any packages other than what it needs to do just that. Switch to Arch if you're a m…

I appreciate the minimalist philosophy, and Arch is on my todo list (it's even got a vm allocated). However, I seemed to have evolved into a more dual-pronged strategy - Full featured Ubuntu desktop, with relatively stripped down Ubuntu/Cent/OpenSUSE servers running in VMs.

For my desktop, I still value 'just works' over minimalism. Things like Spotify just work out of the box. And any software I may want to play with in the future that has to choose which distro to target will most likely target Ubuntu and Fedora first.

Also, the Debian repo is extensive, and the Ubuntu PPA system almost always compensates for when the Debian package is too outdated.

I also like where Ubuntu is going with the UI/UX. At first I hated the idea of the sidebar, but after trying it and realizing it autohides and stays out of your way most of the time, I switched my opinion. And I'm really looking forward to HUD in 12.04. I've been wanting an integrated Gnome-Do/Synapse for a long time now.

Finally, I get my minimalism fix where it's most important - on the servers. I can set up a local dev environment using vm's that mirrors production - database server on one vm, app server on another vm, and Nginx running on the desktop and pointing to the app server vm.

It does annoy me to start up htop on the desktop, and compare the plethora of stuff I see there with what htop on the servers displays. But I just accept it for now.

Compared to that best-of-both-worlds setup, Arch seems like it would require more compromises than is worth the time and effort to deal with it. I still intend to learn it, just because I value things that will help me learn Linux (or any of my primary tools) better. But I don't see fully making the switch to Arch.

Thoughts?

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