I’m a little bit underwhelmed, I thought that based off the fact so many people seem to make using this distro their personality I expected… well, more I guess?
Once the basic stuff is set-up, like wifi, a few basic packages, a desktop environment/window manager, and a bit of desktop environment and terminal customisation, then that’s it. Nothing special, just a Linux distribution with less default programs and occasionally having to look up how to install a hardware driver or something if you need to use bluetooth for the first time or something like that.
Am I missing something? How can I make using Arch Linux my personality when once it’s set up it’s just like any other computer?
What exactly is it that people obsess over? The desktop environment and terminal customisation? Setting up NetworkManager with nmcli? Using Vim to edit a .conf file?
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I have used a number of distros over the last 15 years. Once I found one I liked, I stuck with it. I understand the package manager, some of the special features of the distro I use and I don’t really have time to relearn this every couple of months on new distros.
If I want a different “feel”, I change my DE. But that’s about it.
Didn’t bother going through the hoops and installed EndeavourOS which is arch-based with some additional default applications.
For me, the best thing of Arch isn’t the distribution but the Arch wiki. An impressive piece of documentation.
The Arch build system is just as impressive IMO. I’ve written Debian and redhat packages for at least two decades and Arch packaging is just so much easier to handle. The associated tooling for creating and managing build chroots is excellent as well.
That’s the main reason my software is in the AUR but nowhere else. I tried to make a deb package and failed so many times so I just gave up.
EndeavorOS is essentially Arch with a gui installer and a few optional pre-installed packages.
Arch wiki is superb, couldn’t have installed or configured Arch without it.
Which btw is the reason many people ended up with Archlinux… after the x-th time looking up some configuration issues on another distro and landing there.
And the Arch User Repository is really handy when you need some more users.
That’s not a typo but a jest to the security implications, isn’t it?
It was a joke on the dual meaning of “user repository” which I didn’t think about that deeply but that would have been smart.
I’m using Arch because you start with nothing and you can make any system you want. I have disk encryption, btrfs as a filesystem, secure boot with my own custom keys, I’m running self-build kernel, I’m using apparmor and I can use any program from AUR, etc. Thats my personality. Things that you can’t see but are important to me.
On other distros some of these things would be very hard to do. Especially without Arch Wiki.
Now use Gentoo
Linux distros differ only in their package managers, really.
And init systems, and C libraries, and the few that use something other than GNU.
Before the install script, i setup arch manually and added the gnome package that bringd DE and all the good Gnome stuff with it. it was then just the same as any other Gnome DE really. People taut the AUR, but OpenSUSE has same with their software.opensuse.org where packages maintained as experimental or community can be accessed (or by adding OPI). Since OpenSUSE had built in snapshotting, rollback and GUI admin (plus curation to do cleanups and maintemamce already OOTB) I uninstalled Arch. The ArchWiki though, that thing is a masterpiece
Ya, its just some people over exaggerated a bit. As long as you don’t do stuff that obviously tries to mess with core system stuff it should be fine.
That’s basically it. Some Arch users are genuinely just picky about what they want on their system and desire to make their setup as minimal as possible. However, a lot of people who make it their personality just get a superiority complex over having something that’s less accessible to the average user.
Am I missing something?
Yep. You got meme’d – Arch is a distro like any other.
Use it as your daily driver and get really comfortable with it. After this, complain loudly when you see someone doing anything in a different way. Then say “I use Arch btw”
I tried it and was underwhelmed, but also overwhelmed.
I love the idea of choosing everything I want, but Arch also meant the pain of learning to install everything I actually need first.
Is there a minimalistic distro that installs all just the essentials (drivers, services like DHCP, a package manager, desktop GUI), and then I choose from there?
Most of the time it is achieved with the phrase: “I use Arch, btw”. 😉
In a way this post is just long-form “I use Arch, btw” 🤯
Don’t forget shitting on Arch-derived distros.
We save that for Manjaro, endeavor and the others are pretty cool
Yeah I know. Derivate distros are cool only if they don’t stray too far from Arch. How dare a distro do something different.
Keep it up, it’s a super cool look (and healthy) for a distro to hate on its own downstream.
Also wearing unix socks might help
EDIT: A more complete guide.
Also, Blåhajar for better pics
I mean if you want to be blasé about the fact not everyone has the same technical skills as you, sure…
Am I missing something? How can I make using Arch Linux my personality when once it’s set up it’s just like any other computer?
IMO there’s nothing about Arch, or any other distro, that makes it worth using, beyond whatever goals you have. If Arch helps you accomplish that goals, great. If not, pick a different distro that does.
In my case, I want to use the latest version of software and use my own configs without inadvertently breaking stuff, based on some arbitrary set of assumptions that distros like Ubuntu or Fedora have made about how their own distro should be used, and Arch has been the easiest way to do that for me.
Also, as others have said, AUR and PKGBUILDs
You forgot one thing: “I use Arch BTW!”
