Arch Linux

I'm currently playing with https://archlinux.org/ to see if it will fit my needs (simple customizable and fast Linux distribution without containers - because containers are another threat to freedom).

Currently I use openSUSE 15.4 + XFCE4 as main GUI. But I'm more more and more scared by

https://documentation.suse.com/alp/bedrock/

Which locks everything and forces users to use selected container registries (bye bye freedom of choice)...

So in future I will have only 2 options:

Use Linux distribution that will keep using packages - currently Debian and/or Arch and several others (but the list is slowly shrinking) to avoid container trap pursued by Canonical (snap), RedHat (flatpack) and SUSE (what's name?)
Switch to FreeBSD, NetBSD or OpenBSD - there is additional benefit that there is no systemd. Especially systemd case is painful remainder to all its preachers that it is necessary for Unix system to work - so how could BSDs run without systemd? Miracle?

Shortcomings of Arch Linux

Several complex packages are missing or challenging on Arch Linux:

GitLab - no official Omnibus packages, you have to carefully follow custom installation guide at: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/GitLab

Update: I did it (with small changes regarding new sidekiq-cluster startup). But later found that https://gitlab.archlinux.org does NOT use that package. They rather use Docker image - see https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/infrastructure/-/blob/master/roles/gitlab/tasks/main.yml?ref_type=heads#L13
OpenStack - installation (Host!) is entirely missing as one can see an empty chapter: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/OpenStack#Deploy_OpenStack (all remainder of Wiki describes Guest images, but not Host installation). There are several AUR packages at the begining, but without guide you are done.

Pacman basics

Pacman is Arch Linux's Package manager. Nice feature is that it is fast.

To update all packages:
```
pacman -Syu
```
To search for package starting with vim:
```
pacman -Ss ^vim
```
To install vim package:
```
pacman -S vim
```
To install vim package and dependencies, but avoid reinstall of already present packages:
```
pacman -S --needed vim
```
To list all files owned by alsa-utils package:
```
pacman -Ql alsa-utils
```

To search full repositories (core and extra) for files (see Generating PDF-manuals):

sudo pacman -Fy tgtermes.sty

Various things I install:

sudo pacman -S --needed lsof curl wget mc vim wget tmux

To have SMB client install

sudo pacman -S --needed smbclient

However there is missing /etc/samba/smb.conf as pointed out on:

https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=234432

you can download it using:

cd
curl -fsSL 'https://git.samba.org/samba.git/?p=samba.git;a=blob_plain;f=examples/smb.conf.default;hb=HEAD' > smb.conf

and install:

sudo mkdir -p /etc/samba
sudo cp smb.conf /etc/samba

in my case I need to enable NT1 protocol to connect to very old NAS:

diff -u /etc/samba/smb.conf{.orig,}
--- /etc/samba/smb.conf.orig    2023-06-07 12:44:39.969302787 +0200
+++ /etc/samba/smb.conf 2023-06-07 12:46:08.328958183 +0200
@@ -21,6 +21,8 @@
 #
 #======================= Global Settings =====================================
 [global]
+client min protocol = NT1
+server min protocol = NT1
 
 # workgroup = NT-Domain-Name or Workgroup-Name, eg: MIDEARTH
    workgroup = MYGROUP

and test it:
```
smbclient -N -L IP_OF_YOUR_SMB_SERVER
```

Use AUR (Community) repositories

Many packages are available on 3rd party repositories called Arch User Repository (AUR) for various reasons (for example license).

I will show example for streamripper (it allows saving songs from Internet radios).

As can be easily googled it is available only on AUR:

https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/streamripper

So now we have to follow https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Arch_User_Repository to setup our Arch linux for building package from AUR repositories:

First we have to install development package and git:

sudo pacman -S --needed base-devel devtools git

Now checkout our AUR package:

mkdir -p ~/aur
cd ~/aur
git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/streamripper.git
cd streamripper

Ensure there is PKGBUILD file and run build:

ls -l PKGBUILD
makepkg -cs --nosign

confirm installation of dependencies.

after a while package should be build:

ls -og *.zst

-rw-r--r-- 1 81618 Jun  7 11:08 streamripper-1.64.6-4-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst

and install it:

sudo pacman -U streamripper-1.64.6-4-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst

and command like this should start saving radio streams (see Audio section below):

cd
streamripper http://stream.antenne.de:80/heavy-metal
# it should create folder named by your RADIO station and store streamed MP3s there

To see all your pacman installation command history try this:

grep PACMAN /var/log/pacman.log

IPv6 notes

By default IPv6 announces your MAC based address (which is perfect for tracking your PC around whole Internet). To use rather temporary IPv6 address you have to follow https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/IPv6#Privacy_extensions

In my case I created file /etc/sysctl.d/40-ipv6.conf with contents:

# replace MAC based IPv6 addresses with temporary IP addresses
net.ipv6.conf.all.use_tempaddr = 2
net.ipv6.conf.default.use_tempaddr = 2
net.ipv6.conf.eth0.use_tempaddr = 2

And reloaded it with systemctl restart systemd-sysctl

My nftables

NF tables is replacement of all existing Linux kernel firewalls (iptables, ip6tables, ebtables,...). It is poorly documented (as most stuff today) with rather incomplete examples.

WARNING!

Direct use of nftables (/etc/nftables.conf) clashes with libvirt - you have to rather use firewalld package that is well integrated with libvirt.

To use nftables on Arch Linux you have to install first:

pacman -S nftables

Here is my /etc/nftables.conf for workstation - based on Arch's original:

table inet filter
delete table inet filter
table inet filter {
  chain input {
    type filter hook input priority filter
    policy drop
    ct state invalid log prefix "[NFT] Input INVALID: " \
	 drop comment "early drop of invalid connections"
    # allow DHCPv4 server -> client
    udp dport 68 ct state { new, untracked } accept
    # allow DHCPv6 server -> client
    udp dport 546 ct state { new, untracked } accept
    ct state {established, related} accept comment "allow tracked connections"
    iifname lo accept comment "allow from loopback"
    ip protocol icmp accept comment "allow icmp"
    meta l4proto ipv6-icmp accept comment "allow icmp v6"
    tcp dport ssh accept comment "allow sshd"
    counter log prefix "[NFT] Input DROP: " drop
  }
  chain forward {
    type filter hook forward priority filter
    policy drop
    counter log prefix "[NFT] Forward DROP: " drop
  }
}

WARNING! Above configuration will not work if you will use libvirt (there are needed many rules for libvirt's NAT network, etc...)

Known features:

intentionally dropping IPv4 multicasts (224.0.0.1) - I have no use for them

Known bugs:

dropping some IPv6 multicasts - not yet resolved

To test it you need to run as root:

/usr/sbin/nft -cf /etc/nftables.conf

When you are ready, enable and start nftables service:

systemctl enable --now nftables

You can reload it any time with:

/usr/sbin/nft -f /etc/nftables.conf

Arch Linux as GUI Workstation

My plan is to evaluate Arch Linux as standard X-Window workstation with sound video, Firefox, LibreOffice - to see how it will compare to existing openSUSE 15.4. I will use XFCE on both environments.

Sound

Let's start with sound card support - on kernel side, today standard is ALSA (which replaced OSS some time ago). Following https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/ALSA we have to:

pacman -S alsa-utils

To list available sound cards you can use:

aplay -L

null
    Discard all samples (playback) or generate zero samples (capture)
default:CARD=NVidia_1
    HDA NVidia, ALC883 Analog
    Default Audio Device
sysdefault:CARD=NVidia_1
    HDA NVidia, ALC883 Analog
    Default Audio Device
...

Default is usually fine.

Now you have to add yourself to group audio using command like:

sudo /usr/sbin/usermod -G audio -a $USER

and logout/login (you can also use newgrp audio but it has side effects)

Setting default volume:

ALSA is "kind" to mute Master volume by default - so you will here nothing...

on 1st terminal run some kind of sound generator

# random noise generator
speaker-test
# play samples
while true;do aplay /usr/share/sounds/alsa/*.wav;done

on 2nd terminal run alsamixer and:
- press M unmute Master channel MM should change to OO
- press Up arrow to set desired volume
- when done press ESC once
now you can abort sound/noise generator on 1st terminal using Ctrl-C
to store settings we have to follow https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/210113/default-sound-volume-for-all-alsa-devices and run:
```
sudo alsactl store
```

Usefull CLI sound application:

mp3 player for both local files and streamed (shoutcast) mp3:
```
pacman -S mpg123
```
to play streamed mp3 radio you can do this:
point your browser to radio list, for example on:
- http://directory.shoutcast.com/?q=250_Rock_0
download Winamp list (pls) - and extract suitable URL from that list.

in my case I can run:

mpg123 http://stream.antenne.de:80/heavy-metal

there is also great program to save songs from radio:
- https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/streamripper
please see section on AUR on this wiki, how to build and install AUR streamripper package.

Please note that situation is much worse on X-Windows side, because:

Gnome pushed their own esound daemon as new standard, how should X-apps access sound device (to solve problem with exclusive device access)
also KDE pushed their own arts sound daemon (of course incompatible with esound)
later there was another innovation - Pulse Audio
and now we have another innovation Pipe Wire

So far it seems that most X-apps prefer Pulse Audio with fallback do direct access to kernel ALSA device. However nobody knows for how long.

X-Window

Once we have working Audio we can install X-Window GUI system.

NOTE: For people from Microsoft OS it may look confusing, becasue:

X-Server is the main process that provides GUI for applications
X-app is client application that connects to GUI X-Server - using DISPLAY environment variable.

So first we have to find X-Server that will work with our graphics card and install start scripts. We have to follow: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Xorg

First we have to know what king of graphics card we have, in my case:

lspci -v | grep -A1 -e VGA -e 3D

06:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation GT218 [GeForce 210] (rev a2) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
	Subsystem: ZOTAC International (MCO) Ltd. GeForce 210 1GB [Synergy Edition]

As pointed out you have 2 choices regarding nVidia:

using proprietary closed-source drivers (this is generally issue because significant portion is in Linux kernel)
using open-source 2D driver - my case

Here is command to install opens-source 2D driver for nVidia:

sudo pacman -S --needed xf86-video-nouveau

All X-server installations also needs common X-server package:

sudo pacman -S --needed xorg-server

We now have 2 choices how to run X-Window:

using GUI login manager that always starts when system boots (original was called XDM - X-Window Display Manager)
using startx script

I prefer later option - because sometimes I simply don't need local GUI (or I will do ssh -Y and run command remotely). So we have to follow: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Xinit

sudo pacman -S --needed xorg-xinit

Now we need to install suitable Window Manager or whole environment - I always vote for XFCE. So we have to follow: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Xfce

For the first time I will install both xfce4 and additions:

pacman -S --needed xfce4 xfce4-goodies
# I always press ENTER to accept default options
# It will install around 500MB of files

Now we have to modify session startup script /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc this way:

diff -u /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc{.orig,}
--- /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc.orig	2023-06-07 11:29:18.176548108 +0200
+++ /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc	2023-06-07 11:30:07.213023532 +0200
@@ -48,8 +48,8 @@
  unset f
 fi
 
-twm &
-xclock -geometry 50x50-1+1 &
-xterm -geometry 80x50+494+51 &
-xterm -geometry 80x20+494-0 &
-exec xterm -geometry 80x66+0+0 -name login
+/usr/bin/xfce4-terminal &
+exec /usr/bin/startxfce4
+# here we will get only in case of failure
+exit 1
+

To start X-Window:

login on LOCAL console as non-root user
run startx
after a while you should see xfce4-terminal
few seconds later XFCE4 Window manager with menus should initialize

If you are lucky you can test 3D graphics:

sudo pacman -S --needed mesa-demos

Ant try something famous - for example gears (you can use Arrows keys to rotate view and ESC to quit) or also famous teapot.

Customizing X-Window

There is already installed Thunar file manager (included with XFCE). To support:

MTP (Android devices connected via USB)
SMB (Windows shares)

We have to install Gnome VFS packages:

pacman -S --needed gvfs-mtp gvfs-smb

WARNING! You may need to restart whole system in some cases so Thunar will now support smb://... or some gvfsd services.

New we will gradually add various components to have comfort X-Environment

Installing additional fonts: I tried:

# traditonal X-Window fonts
pacman -S --needed xorg-font-util xorg-fonts-100dpi xorg-fonts-75dpi xorg-fonts-misc xorg-fonts-type1
# various fixed size fonts for terminals
pacman -S --needed terminus-font
pacman -S --needed ttf-fantasque-sans-mono ttf-fira-mono ttf-jetbrains-mono ttf-monofur ttf-monoid
pacman -S --needed otf-crimson-pro ttf-anonymous-pro ttf-crimson-pro

Best PDF viewer:

sudo pacman -S --needed evince

WARNING! Latest Evince has annoying "popup" feature. As true Gnome application it can't be disabled:

https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/evince/-/issues/1521

WinAmp like player:

pacman -S --needed qmmp

To install right Firefox + uBlock plugin we may follow:

pacman -S --needed firefox firefox-ublock-origin

WARNING! If you install firefox-developer-edition you will need to install external plugins - those one provided packages (for example above firefox-ublock-origin will not work, becasue there is different path:

plugin packages install into /usr/lib/firefox/browser/extensions/
but firefox-developer-edition uses /usr/lib/firefox-developer-edition/browser/....

To be able to download videos from various sites (that are flooded with ads and thus unusable):

sudo pacman -S --needed ffmpeg yt-dlp

NOTE: yt-dlp is not X-Windows application - you can happily use it even from CLI

TODO: Proper audio support - testing:

sudo pacman -S --needed pulseaudio-alsa pavucontrol

If you like GUI for SMART disk utility (smartctl on CLI) you can install:

sudo pacman -S --needed gsmartcontrol

Now something controversial: There are some websites and applications that do not work under Firefox (Teams, Skype) or have issues under Firefox (tme.eu e-shop). For such cases I have to install Chromium (open-source base for Chrome):

sudo pacman -S --needed chromium

Tips

If you clone or transfer Arch filesystem to another hardware or another filesystem you have to regenerate initrd with additional -P (presets) option, e.g., mkinitcpio -P

Using Hyprland

Hyprland is unique "Window Manager", err. Wayland compositor. Official Arch wiki page is on https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Hyprland

You should install at least these packages:

pacman -S --needed hyprland kitty waybar wofi

Where:

hyprland is Wayland compositor
kitty is interesting terminal (using kitten icat image.png it can display images between text and other stuff
waybar provides basic applets (from sway compositor)
wofi provides nice application menu

You have to start it from local console using command Hyprland (notice capital letter H). Most important shortcuts:

Win+Q - runs Kitty terminal
Win+R - runs application menu (wofi)
WIn+M - exists hyprland

After first run you can find all shortcuts in generated config file ~/.config/hypr/hyprland.conf

Lynx with UTF-8 on console

To run Lynx with proper UTF-8 characters on local console (with ISO-8859-2 characters available) I use:

echo $LANG
# must output something with UTF-8: en_US.UTF-8

# this loads ISO-8859-2 characters with UTF-8 translation (I hope)
setfont  lat2-16
showconsolefont 
lynx -display_charset utf-8

Combining:

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Linux_console And other sources.

Warning! File ~/lynx_bookmarks.html has specified ISO-8859-1 encoding by default. You can fix it by overriding this line to:

<META http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8">

Tip: under regular terminal just using lynx -display_charset utf-8 should work (xfce4-terminal uses UTF-8 as default).

Resources

Infrastructure
- nice overview: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/DeveloperWiki:Staff_Services
- key project with ansible roles: https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/infrastructure
creating custom packages (TODO)

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Arch Linux

Arch Linux

Shortcomings of Arch Linux

Pacman basics

Use AUR (Community) repositories

IPv6 notes

My nftables

Arch Linux as GUI Workstation

Sound

X-Window

Customizing X-Window

Tips

Using Hyprland

Lynx with UTF-8 on console

Resources

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