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 minimalist.
My rig only runs Stumpwm on Xorg. I only use xterm, emacs, and the usual GNU toolchain. A couple of interpreters. I have installed GTK so I can use Firefox (and so I can hack on Firefox), but nothing else. I don't have a crap load of applications running in the background waiting to notify me of crap I don't care about or services that I never use. I know exactly what runs on my system and it does no more than that and no less.
I think Arch fills a very nice niche and I'm so happy it exists.
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...
Mac has major package management issues. Homebrew is fine (not as good as the linux counterparts, but fine), but if you make the mistake of installing Ruby with RVM Homebrew won't work, and you will spend a lot of time fixing it. With Arch you just have to get your basics set up and any development related item you need, there are precompiled packages you will install in seconds.
My favorite thing about running on an Arch system is I know what's going on all the time. If an Ubuntu system breaks I'm generally dealing with a mass of preinstalled things, it's hard to know what's relevant.
Similarly for increasing boot speed, I really like knowing exactly what I need to be running at any one time.
I appreciate it's not for everyone, but I imagine most coders around here who run a Linux system would benefit a lot by taking the time to set up an install and having it work how they like.
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 install the installer, what is maintenance going to be like for anything remotely complicated?"
And that's when I realized that while it's fun to tweak and fiddle, I have real work to do and doing things like fighting with a package manager and installing drivers is not very high on my to-do list. I ended up rolling back to 11.04, which I'll probably stick with for some time.
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 for regular community repository packages, as those can be installed via pacman just fine.
If you do want something from the AUR, are customizing one of the official packages, or are trying your hand at packaging something else, editing PKGBUILD files and using makepkg manually is pretty straight forward once you've done it once or twice.
The community is very helpful and responsive...on the forums, mailing list, and on IRC. Feel free to stop by if you ever want to give it another shot and get stuck.
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 needed software, repos downloaded and ready to do real work in one hour flat. And if I wanted real challenge and had way too much free time, I'd probably try LFS. Or shoot myself in the foot.
If you don't like the way Ubuntu went, go with Debian (sid if you like the warm feeling of having the newest stuff).
I ran with an arch install for about a semester, similarly after not liking Ubuntu's direction. I figured it was also a nice time to try out a tiling window manage so I used xmonad. It was fun for a bit and the rolling release cycle was nice, but when it comes down to it every small change takes too much time. You end up hunting down config files or hacking things to work the way you want them and it can burn hours.
I like Arch as a whole but I've found that for my purposes it is a time sink compared to Debian for example.
Debian has lots of sensible well thought out defaults. Arch has lots of disparate defaults each provided by the package vendor (as they don't customise packages).
It's not a criticism, but a difference to bear in mind.
That was my experience too. I switched to Debian from Arch a half year ago or so and I've spent far less time maintaining it; and once I'm used to "the Debian way" I can navigate new packages without having to think about it. And updates don't break my system or fail to deploy, and 'python' isn't a symlink for 'python3.2'.
I also reported a major security vulnerability in the default configuration of an Arch package but I had to reopen it because the maintainer said something stupid like "people who install this package should operate on trusted networks". What?
This is a great comment and the key phrase is "for my purposes..."
Many people look at a particular OS, decide that it's not right for what they need or want, and jump straight to "that OS sucks because it doesn't meet my needs." It should be fairly obvious how that is just a silly thing to think.
Different OSs meet different needs. We should strive to understand our own needs and to understand our options so we can make the optimal choice for our particular situation.
As an arch user myself, I like (and can afford the time) to tweak and fiddle with my setup so that it's just right for my workflow. Another reason I use it, is that it's a great way to learn more about linux.
Arch probably is not right for people who need lots of stability or don't have the time to fiddle and tweak the OS. And that's ok. There are many other options they can use. It sounds like Debian is the right fit for you and that's awesome.
Glancing through the instructions, it looks like things might have got better than when I installed arch linux around 6 months ago. At the point I felt like installation involved a lot of carefully designed "busy work", which I couldn't imagine not wanting to do, but which had to be done exactly.
The reason I left is because of their incredibly bizarre choice to make /usr/bin/python run python3, and messing headers around so much you couldn't build gcc from source. Between these two features, it made the system basically unusable for me.
Those downsides were upsides for me. I love that everything must be configured on Arch, because I know that I am doing all the configuring. I've tried to customize Ubuntu's motd, change services to start backgrounded, and install packages from source in a way that integrates with the packaging system. Ubuntu likes to get in the way of this in the name of simplicity and for a casual or even intermediate user, sure, this works. For advanced users too, depending on your priorities.
Arch is awesome because it's basically FreeBSD-like packaging and something not unlike FreeBSD's service configuration on a Linux box. Things are in a predictable place, rather than in /usr/local OR /usr/, and installing source packages is something that is very customizable and very easy. It yields the responsibility to be careful about your versions to you, but in doing so gives you an immense amount of power to be the master of your system.
For minimal systems, where you know what you're doing, it's fantastic. Running Xorg is a bit of a pain, but I hardly blame Arch, and if something that "just works" were what I was going for, I wouldn't run Arch. I wouldn't use it on my MBP, but it's been running great on my home server for quite some time.
It feels like he's describing installing Linux (any distribution) around 1997-1998. A bit complex, lots of manual setup, etc. Not terrible, and it has its benefits for sure, but it feels a tad like a step back.
Honestly, the install isn't so terrible. The documentation is pretty excellent, and while it does take about 2 hours for the first install, if you need to install it on a different machine (or you really, really screw up your install), it'll probably only take a half hour.
My main issue is that the rolling release thing didn't actually solve the problem that I expected it to - which is that I didn't want to need to install a new release every 6 months to keep up with changes. While Arch makes it so that you don't need to frequently re-install, if you don't update often enough, you can get into situations where upgrading will break your system.
At this point, I'm afraid to do the upgrade on my server for a number of reasons, first is that I might run out of disk space on root part-way through (I should mount something else to /tmp for this). And, the other reason, as mentioned above, is that the upgrade might bork my system, and that's just something that I can't afford on my server.
I realize now that this was a really poor choice as a server distro, but I am happy that Arch does not get in your way with system config stuff and you can find just about anything you want to install in either the base or community repos.
I use Arch on my laptop for daily use, it brings in my paychecks. The benefit is, once you have it setup, it is dead-simple easy to maintain. All my applications and libraries are always up to date and there are no big releases or reinstalls. It is easier than dealing with Ubuntu releases every 6 months and their constant interface changes.
Also I use some esoteric software that is more difficult to get on Ubuntu.
I use arch at both work and home. It's not really that bad to configure and setup although I guess my usual setup isn't really "a normal user" in terms of 99% of PC users. If you are familiar with linux itself then it's straightforward to get running. I actually prefer it over the likes of ubuntu.
I'm a developer though that's been using Linux as my main OS since the days of red hat 4 in 1996 so I'm quite used to it. Arch focuses more towards seasoned users that want to do their configuration this way. The rolling release schedule can introduce some issues for me but they typically are fixed within hours to a few days as new packages come in.
All in all I'm very happy with it as my primary OS for both work (within a creative agency) and at home. Certainly as a developer I've found it far easier to get things to work on it than other linux flavours.
Different strokes for different folks really. I still continue to recommend Ubuntu and Fedora to friends looking a more friendly and "out of the box" experience. Arch is not there to fill that niche.
Distributions like this can't be taken seriously. They're for the outcasts of the neckbeard crowd.
Cynically I suppose that the people involved in making this software aren't encouraged to improve ease of use because then they couldn't be "helpful" in the IRC channel used for support.
Is something like this the reason so many open-source projects so vehemently opposed to usability?
I've been using Arch for the last 7-8 months and I think my love affair with it has already peaked.
Everything written here is true re: learning about Linux, having more control, straightforward architecture, bleeding edge software, etc.
But the instability factor eventually will bite you in the ass, and per Murphy's Law, often at the worst possible time. It's happened to me twice in this time span.
My solution is to use a separate data partition for all my files and install Arch and a more stable distro (Mint in my case) in different partitions. Both OSs link to the data partition and grab dotfiles and things from a git repo.
Arch is my preferred environment, with a tiling WM and everything painstakingly set up for my preferred workflow. But when it crashes, I can still use my workstation to get stuff done, and go about troubleshooting when I have free time.
Arch is fun to play with. A couple years ago the fact that everything was i686 optimized was a big deal. These days just about everyone is using 64bit. It's a good choice for embedded linux systems and servers (Beyond Oblivion used arch for their servers).
Speaking from experience, life is just too short to run arch on a laptop. Heck, I have a hp pavilion dv7 with switching graphics and even that was a pita to get stable on ubuntu.
I run arch on a laptop with no problems at all. I specifically got a laptop with intel graphics and wireless so I have a great experience with any distro :) Arch required almost no setup when it came to graphics/sound/wireless. Just had to install xf86-video-intel and xf86-input-synaptics.
IMO its best to stay the hell away from switchable graphics period if you intend to use linux.
As a developer who has been using Linux as a desktop and enjoys tweaking every little thing: I think Arch is fantastic. It took my understanding of the OS and exactly what is going on to the next level.
However I work with developers who don't want to tweak every little thing they just want their OS to work and let them be passionate about development. They should stick to OSX, or if they are feeling adventurous try Ubuntu. I also would not suggest Arch if you have not used another more friendly Linux distro for a while and had the "opportunity" to troubleshoot some issues and enjoyed it.
To enjoy Arch you really have to be passionate about Linux and tweaking your machine, otherwise you will just be frustrated. For those that are I cannot recommend Arch enough.
Arch is great, but my favorite thing about it is that it stays out of the way. It led me to using new tools like XMonad and MPD. I could be perfectly happy with using the same setup on debian-unstable, but never would have got there without Arch.
The package manager Arch uses, pacman, recently introduced package signing (albeit with a few bugs to iron out.) I wonder if more people will start to use Arch as a server OS now.
I find Archbang to be a good compromise. It presents a minimal Arch install with X+openbox (a la Crunchbang, hence the name) pre-configured. It has a live CD too, so really, it' s just like plain old regular Arch except you don't need a 2nd computer during install ^^
Arch is incredibly stable - you just have to rethink your idea of what stability means in an Arch context.
In Ubuntu, 'stability' means that you can run apt-get upgrade all (I think that's the command), press 'y' a few times (or, better yet, just pipe 'yes' to it) and then forget about it, knowing that your system may not have the latest version of every package, but the latest version in the Ubuntu repos, which is presumably 'stable' with the rest of the system.
With Arch, you have to think before you -Syu. Running pacman -Syu will upgrade all packages to the latest version in the Arch repos, which are usually updated much more quickly, as it's a rolling-release distribution. This means that you may want to check the mailing lists before upgrading important packages, or wait until a later time to upgrade. Or not upgrade at all, which is 'stable' by virtue of the fact that you haven't changed anything. The choice is yours. You can decide what to do on a per-package or system-wide basis, depending on your use case (Personal user & tinkerer? Luddite personal user? Large-scale server? There's no 'one-size-fits-all' approach to keeping a system up-to-date, but Arch is a 'one-size-fits-all' distro in that it allows people to make these decisions for themselves very easily).
Rolling release isn't for everyone - I'll agree. But that's the main difference between Arch and other distributions. (That, and it's highly minimalist by default, whereas Ubuntu and Mint are 'everything and the kitchen sink' by default). But I certainly wouldn't say that Arch is any more or less stable than other Linux distributions (I can't compare to BSD), because it's really just as stable as you want it to be, given your definition of 'stable'.
That's not so far off. It has all of the really beautiful system stuff of FreeBSD (rc.conf, predictable file hierarchy, documentation) and matches them or does better. It forces you to learn how things work and does a good job of teaching you good practices. Even if you don't use Arch, the Arch wiki is a gold mine on configuring pretty much anything.
The main thing Arch has over FreeBSD is you get easy access to lots of shiny toys. Pacman repos update much more frequently and the process of updating packages is much faster. If your favorite text editor drops a new version, it will be available in Arch repos in minutes/hours; it may be months before it makes it to FreeBSD ports. And things like audio, video drivers, wireless are pretty painless in Arch compared to FreeBSD.
The biggest downside of Arch is that it sits on the complete opposite side of the security spectrum. FreeBSD makes sure you start with a secure machine and anything you do to cheapen the security is your bag; most of the time it'll try to let you know you when you're doing it wrong. The BSDs in general have a really healthy culture of security paranoia. You don't get that with Arch. Signed packages have only recently made their way into pacman and I'm not sure if they're even required yet. So a lot of the time, it feels like you just have to cross your fingers and trust that the repos you're hitting haven't been compromised. And you're constantly installing software from them.
Also, occasionally you'll need to spend 5 or 10 minutes recovering from a wonky upgrade (upgrading often is better than not).
Arch is an excellent, if not secure, desktop/laptop environment and you'd be crazy to run a production server on it.
I started using Arch about eight months ago, when Ubuntu didn't have the latest ATI and Xorg packaged so I could use EyeFinity + 3 monitors. At the time, I was very sad to leave my comfy Debian/Ubuntu roots.
After struggling a little with the initial setup, I got everything in place, and it has just worked since then. Breakage from upgrades has been no worse than Ubuntu, and my Python work hasn't been disturbed at all.
For those who don't mind rolling up their sleeves and just RTFM'ing it, this is a great distro.
I have an ArchLinux installed at home. Well I am unsure on what to think. It can be used to go on the internet, have the latest software but if you are serious on coding stable things well... you're going to cry.
Since you always have the latest packets ready your code is going to be often broken by changes in the libraries (damn Boost!). Other problem, if you leave your computer untouched for 1 months you'll have 1 Gb of updates to do.
But it's still a very good distribution, just be careful about what to use.
>First of all, nothing works out of the box. You will have to manually set up the driver for your video card, support for your sound card (which can be a little difficult if you use USB headphones), wifi support, Xorg, your desktop environment and/or window manager of choice, etc.
I've been using Arch for a number of years and I don't see why the author thinks it's so difficult to set up.
During installation I only set up partitioning and /etc/rc.conf which is the main configuration file. I'd set up partitions and change some default settings (like keymap, locale, etc) on any computer, so it's not a problem. I also make sure wicd is installed for painless Wifi configuration.
After the first boot, I install most of the stuff I use with a one-liner, something like this:
pacman -S xorg xfce4 chromium-browser pidgin gdm thunderbird mc skype htop vim gcc ruby
and that's my base system.
Plus, being a rolling release distro means that you don't have to do major upgrades (which tend to break things more often than not). The installation I'm currently using on my main computer is about 20 months old and I've even changed my machine since then.
My video card works after installing xorg, sound works out of the box, wifi works out of the box, etc.
Something the article mentions, but bears repeating, it that Arch has an excellent wiki on just about every component you're likely to use. So for those fearful of having to set everything up yourself, the wiki will be your savior.
First of all, nothing works out of the box. You will have to manually set up the driver for your video card, support for your sound card (which can be a little difficult if you use USB headphones), wifi support, Xorg, your desktop environment and/or window manager of choice, etc.
Literally everything mentioned here worked out of the box for me when I installed Arch (except for USB headphones, which I do not own).
Author here. I think we're talking about two different things. By "nothing works out of the box" I mean that you need to set it up yourself. For example, the Beginner's Guide leads you through setup of your video driver [1], ALSA [2], Xorg [3], and wifi [4]. These are all things that require manual work. Maybe there's a more appropriate term for this than "doesn't work out of the box" (?) but it's the first term that came to mind.
Out of the box typically means "with no effort after initial install". I'm sure you did a pacman -S gnome or something like that after the initial install.
That said, Arch does have very sane defaults, so I'm sure after using pacman to install your DE or graphics drivers, it worked fine.
All too true. Both my work and home computers run Arch. At work, dual monitors on a single ati video card with xinerama was a HUGE pain in the ass. I ended up just running without xinerama and the Driver/Screen/Monitor/Server sections, let X choose its defaults, and then use xrandr to get the monitors working proper, although they still don't share the same background image, I can live with it.
In Archs defense though, setting up xorg is simply installing the packages which is trivially easy with pacman. I love it to death.
I constantly switch between using two external monitors through my docking station, using my TV through HDMI, or just the internal display. I don't even have an xorg.conf file. The defaults are perfectly fine and RandR does the job of changing outputs while X is running.
Technically true, but misleading. I've installed Arch on four machines of various hardware, and this is actually the easiest part of the installation process.
You have to select a driver from a comprehensive list of which drivers work for which cards, and you don't have to make any (non-trivial) changes to xorg.conf, unless you want to set up multiple monitors. (And even then, I was able to avoid that for a long time by using XFCE, which apparently doesn't mind when xorg.conf settings are unspecified/improperly specified).
Yes, everything has to be set up manually on an Arch system, but that's a feature - you know where everything on your system is, and you know that there's nothing you didn't add yourself.
And with the wiki, setup may take some time (again, by design), but the process is incredibly straightforward.
I'm running arch and home and have a love / hate (mostly love) relationship with it. It's certainly taken up a lot of my time, but I learned more about linux just by installing it than I did in months of using ubuntu. Getting something to work is so satisfying, as it usually involves learning quite a bit about how it works, but there are times when you just want something working and it can be frustrating.
Being forced to make all those choices was the best part about it for me. I'm sure it's possible to customize Ubuntu to look like my arch set up, but if I hadn't been forced I likely wouldn't have tried. I'm currently running i3 as my window manager and I love it. I use a macbook pro at work, and It's nice but going back to a non-tiling window manager after getting used to i3 is pretty painful.
It's interesting how relative people's experience can be: for me, it was the opposite, as I feel that Arch has let me save a lot of time. I was using Gentoo at the time I decided to switch to Arch, and the relatively deeper understanding of the internals of the OS that is necessary to keep a stable Gentoo system made Arch feel like a very well-designed Lego toy. I guess that LFS people coming to Gentoo would feel the same :)
TLDR: I love Arch, I feel that I don't lose time on it because I made the switch from Gentoo.
[+] [-] agentultra|14 years ago|reply
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 minimalist.
My rig only runs Stumpwm on Xorg. I only use xterm, emacs, and the usual GNU toolchain. A couple of interpreters. I have installed GTK so I can use Firefox (and so I can hack on Firefox), but nothing else. I don't have a crap load of applications running in the background waiting to notify me of crap I don't care about or services that I never use. I know exactly what runs on my system and it does no more than that and no less.
I think Arch fills a very nice niche and I'm so happy it exists.
[+] [-] pnathan|14 years ago|reply
But Arch seems really cool if you want to rebuild Linux systems for fun & knowledge!
[+] [-] shaurz|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] MatthewPhillips|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fingerprinter|14 years ago|reply
Now I just want something that works, gets updates and gets out of my way so I can build stuff. Ubuntu FTW.
I tried Mac, but nothing, and I do mean nothing, beats apt. Lenovo X220 running Ubuntu 12.04 seems about perfect to me at the moment.
[+] [-] swasheck|14 years ago|reply
There's a tremendous amount of creativity that goes into customizing an OS to meet every need you have --- and ONLY those needs.
[+] [-] ElliotH|14 years ago|reply
Similarly for increasing boot speed, I really like knowing exactly what I need to be running at any one time.
I appreciate it's not for everyone, but I imagine most coders around here who run a Linux system would benefit a lot by taking the time to set up an install and having it work how they like.
[+] [-] acabal|14 years ago|reply
And that's when I realized that while it's fun to tweak and fiddle, I have real work to do and doing things like fighting with a package manager and installing drivers is not very high on my to-do list. I ended up rolling back to 11.04, which I'll probably stick with for some time.
[+] [-] elasticdog|14 years ago|reply
If you do want something from the AUR, are customizing one of the official packages, or are trying your hand at packaging something else, editing PKGBUILD files and using makepkg manually is pretty straight forward once you've done it once or twice.
The community is very helpful and responsive...on the forums, mailing list, and on IRC. Feel free to stop by if you ever want to give it another shot and get stuck.
[+] [-] biobot|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zalew|14 years ago|reply
If you don't like the way Ubuntu went, go with Debian (sid if you like the warm feeling of having the newest stuff).
[+] [-] gonehome|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bwarp|14 years ago|reply
Debian has lots of sensible well thought out defaults. Arch has lots of disparate defaults each provided by the package vendor (as they don't customise packages).
It's not a criticism, but a difference to bear in mind.
[+] [-] klodolph|14 years ago|reply
I also reported a major security vulnerability in the default configuration of an Arch package but I had to reopen it because the maintainer said something stupid like "people who install this package should operate on trusted networks". What?
[+] [-] nwj|14 years ago|reply
Many people look at a particular OS, decide that it's not right for what they need or want, and jump straight to "that OS sucks because it doesn't meet my needs." It should be fairly obvious how that is just a silly thing to think.
Different OSs meet different needs. We should strive to understand our own needs and to understand our options so we can make the optimal choice for our particular situation.
As an arch user myself, I like (and can afford the time) to tweak and fiddle with my setup so that it's just right for my workflow. Another reason I use it, is that it's a great way to learn more about linux.
Arch probably is not right for people who need lots of stability or don't have the time to fiddle and tweak the OS. And that's ok. There are many other options they can use. It sounds like Debian is the right fit for you and that's awesome.
[+] [-] unknown|14 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] CJefferson|14 years ago|reply
Glancing through the instructions, it looks like things might have got better than when I installed arch linux around 6 months ago. At the point I felt like installation involved a lot of carefully designed "busy work", which I couldn't imagine not wanting to do, but which had to be done exactly.
The reason I left is because of their incredibly bizarre choice to make /usr/bin/python run python3, and messing headers around so much you couldn't build gcc from source. Between these two features, it made the system basically unusable for me.
[+] [-] koko775|14 years ago|reply
Arch is awesome because it's basically FreeBSD-like packaging and something not unlike FreeBSD's service configuration on a Linux box. Things are in a predictable place, rather than in /usr/local OR /usr/, and installing source packages is something that is very customizable and very easy. It yields the responsibility to be careful about your versions to you, but in doing so gives you an immense amount of power to be the master of your system.
For minimal systems, where you know what you're doing, it's fantastic. Running Xorg is a bit of a pain, but I hardly blame Arch, and if something that "just works" were what I was going for, I wouldn't run Arch. I wouldn't use it on my MBP, but it's been running great on my home server for quite some time.
[+] [-] tibbon|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] emil10001|14 years ago|reply
My main issue is that the rolling release thing didn't actually solve the problem that I expected it to - which is that I didn't want to need to install a new release every 6 months to keep up with changes. While Arch makes it so that you don't need to frequently re-install, if you don't update often enough, you can get into situations where upgrading will break your system.
At this point, I'm afraid to do the upgrade on my server for a number of reasons, first is that I might run out of disk space on root part-way through (I should mount something else to /tmp for this). And, the other reason, as mentioned above, is that the upgrade might bork my system, and that's just something that I can't afford on my server.
I realize now that this was a really poor choice as a server distro, but I am happy that Arch does not get in your way with system config stuff and you can find just about anything you want to install in either the base or community repos.
[+] [-] naner|14 years ago|reply
Also I use some esoteric software that is more difficult to get on Ubuntu.
[+] [-] jaymzcd|14 years ago|reply
I'm a developer though that's been using Linux as my main OS since the days of red hat 4 in 1996 so I'm quite used to it. Arch focuses more towards seasoned users that want to do their configuration this way. The rolling release schedule can introduce some issues for me but they typically are fixed within hours to a few days as new packages come in.
All in all I'm very happy with it as my primary OS for both work (within a creative agency) and at home. Certainly as a developer I've found it far easier to get things to work on it than other linux flavours.
Different strokes for different folks really. I still continue to recommend Ubuntu and Fedora to friends looking a more friendly and "out of the box" experience. Arch is not there to fill that niche.
[+] [-] astrodust|14 years ago|reply
Cynically I suppose that the people involved in making this software aren't encouraged to improve ease of use because then they couldn't be "helpful" in the IRC channel used for support.
Is something like this the reason so many open-source projects so vehemently opposed to usability?
[+] [-] pandeiro|14 years ago|reply
Everything written here is true re: learning about Linux, having more control, straightforward architecture, bleeding edge software, etc.
But the instability factor eventually will bite you in the ass, and per Murphy's Law, often at the worst possible time. It's happened to me twice in this time span.
My solution is to use a separate data partition for all my files and install Arch and a more stable distro (Mint in my case) in different partitions. Both OSs link to the data partition and grab dotfiles and things from a git repo.
Arch is my preferred environment, with a tiling WM and everything painstakingly set up for my preferred workflow. But when it crashes, I can still use my workstation to get stuff done, and go about troubleshooting when I have free time.
[+] [-] riledhel|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Deinumite|14 years ago|reply
I Arch Linux for my last semester of school and didn't have any problems, I didn't find it unstable at all.
[+] [-] shanemhansen|14 years ago|reply
Speaking from experience, life is just too short to run arch on a laptop. Heck, I have a hp pavilion dv7 with switching graphics and even that was a pita to get stable on ubuntu.
[+] [-] bwat47|14 years ago|reply
IMO its best to stay the hell away from switchable graphics period if you intend to use linux.
[+] [-] alanpeabody|14 years ago|reply
However I work with developers who don't want to tweak every little thing they just want their OS to work and let them be passionate about development. They should stick to OSX, or if they are feeling adventurous try Ubuntu. I also would not suggest Arch if you have not used another more friendly Linux distro for a while and had the "opportunity" to troubleshoot some issues and enjoyed it.
To enjoy Arch you really have to be passionate about Linux and tweaking your machine, otherwise you will just be frustrated. For those that are I cannot recommend Arch enough.
[+] [-] chrishenn|14 years ago|reply
The package manager Arch uses, pacman, recently introduced package signing (albeit with a few bugs to iron out.) I wonder if more people will start to use Arch as a server OS now.
[+] [-] Adaptive|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] timdot|14 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] babarock|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mberning|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] chimeracoder|14 years ago|reply
In Ubuntu, 'stability' means that you can run apt-get upgrade all (I think that's the command), press 'y' a few times (or, better yet, just pipe 'yes' to it) and then forget about it, knowing that your system may not have the latest version of every package, but the latest version in the Ubuntu repos, which is presumably 'stable' with the rest of the system.
With Arch, you have to think before you -Syu. Running pacman -Syu will upgrade all packages to the latest version in the Arch repos, which are usually updated much more quickly, as it's a rolling-release distribution. This means that you may want to check the mailing lists before upgrading important packages, or wait until a later time to upgrade. Or not upgrade at all, which is 'stable' by virtue of the fact that you haven't changed anything. The choice is yours. You can decide what to do on a per-package or system-wide basis, depending on your use case (Personal user & tinkerer? Luddite personal user? Large-scale server? There's no 'one-size-fits-all' approach to keeping a system up-to-date, but Arch is a 'one-size-fits-all' distro in that it allows people to make these decisions for themselves very easily).
Rolling release isn't for everyone - I'll agree. But that's the main difference between Arch and other distributions. (That, and it's highly minimalist by default, whereas Ubuntu and Mint are 'everything and the kitchen sink' by default). But I certainly wouldn't say that Arch is any more or less stable than other Linux distributions (I can't compare to BSD), because it's really just as stable as you want it to be, given your definition of 'stable'.
[+] [-] wilsaj|14 years ago|reply
The main thing Arch has over FreeBSD is you get easy access to lots of shiny toys. Pacman repos update much more frequently and the process of updating packages is much faster. If your favorite text editor drops a new version, it will be available in Arch repos in minutes/hours; it may be months before it makes it to FreeBSD ports. And things like audio, video drivers, wireless are pretty painless in Arch compared to FreeBSD.
The biggest downside of Arch is that it sits on the complete opposite side of the security spectrum. FreeBSD makes sure you start with a secure machine and anything you do to cheapen the security is your bag; most of the time it'll try to let you know you when you're doing it wrong. The BSDs in general have a really healthy culture of security paranoia. You don't get that with Arch. Signed packages have only recently made their way into pacman and I'm not sure if they're even required yet. So a lot of the time, it feels like you just have to cross your fingers and trust that the repos you're hitting haven't been compromised. And you're constantly installing software from them.
Also, occasionally you'll need to spend 5 or 10 minutes recovering from a wonky upgrade (upgrading often is better than not).
Arch is an excellent, if not secure, desktop/laptop environment and you'd be crazy to run a production server on it.
[+] [-] gtaylor|14 years ago|reply
After struggling a little with the initial setup, I got everything in place, and it has just worked since then. Breakage from upgrades has been no worse than Ubuntu, and my Python work hasn't been disturbed at all.
For those who don't mind rolling up their sleeves and just RTFM'ing it, this is a great distro.
[+] [-] victork2|14 years ago|reply
Since you always have the latest packets ready your code is going to be often broken by changes in the libraries (damn Boost!). Other problem, if you leave your computer untouched for 1 months you'll have 1 Gb of updates to do.
But it's still a very good distribution, just be careful about what to use.
[+] [-] lgeek|14 years ago|reply
I've been using Arch for a number of years and I don't see why the author thinks it's so difficult to set up.
During installation I only set up partitioning and /etc/rc.conf which is the main configuration file. I'd set up partitions and change some default settings (like keymap, locale, etc) on any computer, so it's not a problem. I also make sure wicd is installed for painless Wifi configuration.
After the first boot, I install most of the stuff I use with a one-liner, something like this:
and that's my base system.Plus, being a rolling release distro means that you don't have to do major upgrades (which tend to break things more often than not). The installation I'm currently using on my main computer is about 20 months old and I've even changed my machine since then.
My video card works after installing xorg, sound works out of the box, wifi works out of the box, etc.
[+] [-] MatthewPhillips|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sciurus|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Ideka|14 years ago|reply
Literally everything mentioned here worked out of the box for me when I installed Arch (except for USB headphones, which I do not own).
[+] [-] mcrittenden|14 years ago|reply
[1] https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginners_Guide#Install...
[2] https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginners_Guide#Sound
[3] https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginners_Guide#Install...
[4] https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Wireless_Setup
[+] [-] km3k|14 years ago|reply
That said, Arch does have very sane defaults, so I'm sure after using pacman to install your DE or graphics drivers, it worked fine.
[+] [-] heyrhett|14 years ago|reply
I stopped there http://xkcd.com/963/
[+] [-] loungin|14 years ago|reply
In Archs defense though, setting up xorg is simply installing the packages which is trivially easy with pacman. I love it to death.
[+] [-] lgeek|14 years ago|reply
I have a T420 with Intel graphics.
[+] [-] chimeracoder|14 years ago|reply
You have to select a driver from a comprehensive list of which drivers work for which cards, and you don't have to make any (non-trivial) changes to xorg.conf, unless you want to set up multiple monitors. (And even then, I was able to avoid that for a long time by using XFCE, which apparently doesn't mind when xorg.conf settings are unspecified/improperly specified).
Yes, everything has to be set up manually on an Arch system, but that's a feature - you know where everything on your system is, and you know that there's nothing you didn't add yourself.
And with the wiki, setup may take some time (again, by design), but the process is incredibly straightforward.
[+] [-] cgag|14 years ago|reply
Being forced to make all those choices was the best part about it for me. I'm sure it's possible to customize Ubuntu to look like my arch set up, but if I hadn't been forced I likely wouldn't have tried. I'm currently running i3 as my window manager and I love it. I use a macbook pro at work, and It's nice but going back to a non-tiling window manager after getting used to i3 is pretty painful.
[+] [-] agravier|14 years ago|reply
TLDR: I love Arch, I feel that I don't lose time on it because I made the switch from Gentoo.