Yup. It’s a very manual install that’ll let you screw it up, so it’s gained that reputation. But it really isn’t bad if you follow the wiki (or have done it before).
That’s only if you use an automated script, and only if it works. ‘Default’ install is almost entirely manual, other than letting pacman grab what it needs to.
Arch has been daily driver for years, I’m already familiar with the process. There’s an option for a guided system. The default is a terminal with no guidance.
Nope, I can run it on old potato with 3GB of RAM and i doubt i could run Ubuntu’s full snaps flotila . They also remove the telemetry of Ubuntu. But AFAIK you can turn on snaps. The way i understand it Mint has these main goals : get rid of questionable Ubuntu things, keep it super stable, be welcoming to newcommers (like my none tech parents who never seen Linux could just use Mint outbox the box)
For some reason, this didn’t work on my old phone after installing PixelExperience 11 on it.
There’s a third way. Bluetooth. At least you don’t need a cable, and you’ll save power.
For that reason, I usually use Bluetooth instead of Wi-Fi, unless I need higher bandwidth (except during peak hours of network usage, when my connection speed is below 1Mbps anyway).
I love it, because you can also get best out of both worlds in relation to the comic discusses. You can personalize OS to your liking, and the entire configuration is in a file, so you can redeploy the same setup again.
I feel like I keep posting this everywhere but there’s a project called AstOS that attempts this. Also someone clued me in on this distro neutral solution. AshOS. Full disclosure I haven’t used either.
It looks like solutions like these miss the whole point of what Nix is trying to do. Nix comes with the belief: “Unix has some fundamental issues, because it was designed in specific way. If we store things differently it works really well, and we even get those cool properties for free”.
The authors of those projects instead of thinking “this looks interesting, and it is a paradigm shift but it might be worth to to try feel like Linux noob for some time and start thinking a bit differently how the file system is structured to see if this change is really worth it”
Instead it is: “I don’t need to be PhD in Computer Science (whatever that means), here is how I can force this Nix feature or two on traditional Linux, with ansible, bubble gum and some duct tape and make it immutable-ish, which fails sometimes but, hey, it has the same feature on paper.”
Well to be fair I think it’s because they aren’t trying to be NixOS. You could leverage those arguments against any distro that’s trying out an immutable flavor. Which is mostly accomplished through btrfs features.
I agree that Nix/NixOS does a lot more and it’s a genuinely impressive and paradigm shifting project but it does break with traditional Linux layouts and thinking in a way that immutability doesn’t necessarily have to do.
You could also make the same argument with the systemd and non-systemd crowd.
Either way I look forward to the future of both immutability projects and NixOS. I feel like both areas still need a bit of work but they’re both really exciting fields.
Just add rescue to kernel options (if you use GRUB, press e to edit it for the current boot) and it will boot into console from which you can do downgrade.
When I started using Arch I just set it up on a btrfs filesystem and wrote a simple btrbk hook to take a snapshot before any package updates. That made it trivial to unfuck anything that broke after an update. I can’t remember the last time I had to roll the system back but it’s nice for peace of mind.
Start by playing with subvolumes and snapshots so you can get a feel for how they work. Once you’ve got that down you can break down your root filesystem into sensible subvolume chunks (/, /home, /var/log, /var/cache etc) so that you only snapshot relevant content during each update. I wrote a btrbk config at that point, tested it a few times and then wrote a pacman hook to fire it on install, update or package remove events and went from there.
Here’s what I use to take snapshots - you’ll need to write an appropriate btrbk config file for your subvolume layout but it’s otherwise feature complete. gitlab.com/arglebargle-arch/btrbk-autosnap
Like I mentioned above, I haven’t actually needed to roll the system back in ages but I get a lot of mileage out of being able to reach back in time and grab old versions of files for comparison.
Time shift is a lot easier if you’re just starting out but it also requires a specific subvolume structure and isn’t very flexible.
Edit: pro tip: don’t make /var a separate subvolume from /, it’s way, way, way too easy to roll one or the other (/ or /var) back without the other. If you do that by accident pacman’s state becomes out of sync with the running system and everything breaks. Stick to splitting frequently rewritten data like /var/cache and /var/log off, leave /var itself in the root subvolume.
Well yeah obviously like NixOS. My reason for not using it is that they use a non standard Linux filesystem and it renders a # of packages I want to install incompatible.
I want to see Debain users and Fedora users faces when they noticd they don’t have access the AUR or PKGBUILDs.
I want to see them running sudo make install to install stuff from git.
Also reading the Arch wiki for so long is something new arch users probably do. I installed arch for tens of times btw and for me the system already runs with the installation media.
I am very sure no Debian or Fedora user is done after the installer finishes. Then comes the tricky part of the setup. The one that takes days. Adding ppas and making stuff work fedora doesn’t package.
This process starts with arch right away. From the moment i chroot into my installation.
I actively maintain ~9 computers in my house running arch. Many of them have dual boot arch. E.g. one arch for work, one arch for everything else. One arch for music production, one arch for everything rlse. I run arch on my webserver. I run arch on my home sevrer. I run arch on my wifes gaming desktop. I run arch on my wifes laptop. I run arch on my kids netbook. i run arch on rasberry pi.
I am always a bit disapointed when I install debian every couple of years.
Like, after 1.5 hours, I am like “what, that was all?” Most of the stuff I need is installed by default, just add Jetbrains toolbox, install my ide, add a few more packages and git clone my current project.
While RHEL and Fedora are siblings we can’t mix em’ like that. At least I haven’t ever seen a server with Fedora pre-installed, or anyone offering support on a Fedora server…
We have a piece of fancy and expensive radio equipment in the office, the control part is a Fedora server, with precompiled binaries that run that piece of hardware. Every system library has frozen version, if you upgrade the OS the whole system stops working, and you just reinstall the disk image from the archive, and by reinstall I mean use dd to overwrite the hard drive partition from a supplied DVD.
Huh, at least it’s Linux I guess? I’ve seen plenty Windows XP hanging around controlling expensive medical equipment and one time even a system were the control part was Windows 3.1. Air gapped not for security but because the server didn’t have a NIC.
I switchee to Arch the other month, its been alright except for CUDA getting an update before the NVIDIA driver so I couldn’t run my assignment locally. But I assume that’s my fault because Arch maintainers are all care and no responsibility.
Just restore a snapshot. Or just check which packages are gonna get updated. OR just don’t update right before you have to do critical work.
If none of those work for you, then Arch isn’t for you. That’s fine too. I also sometimes get intrusive thoughts telling me to just go back to Mint. 😁
I’ve found Garuda pretty much gets you all the perks of Arch without the drawbacks and installs just as quickly as debian if not faster. And I love ancient Linux memes as much as anybody but neither Debian or fedora is much to write home about nowadays IMHO.
Endeavour is a great alternative IMHO, but Garuda’s development is definitely more skewed towards gaming and comes with a lot preinstalled/preconfigured.
I’d say it’s even more simple. Comes with stuff like snapper and zram preconfigured and a bunch of tools to do various things. I use their KDE lite version since I do not like their theme AT ALL.
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