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My First Arch Linux Installation Experience

Posted on October 31, 2010 by robbychen

I first heard Arch Linux two years ago when I also discovered Linux from Scratch project. At that time, I didn’t have any experience on GNU/Linux nor the command line. I have finally chosen Ubuntu 8.04 because its good reputation on the Internet. However, I’m not interested in Ubuntu anymore since I recently upgraded to Ubuntu 10.10 and downgraded back to 10.04. Because my GNU/Linux skills have increased during the past years, I have decided to try Arch Linux.

During the installation process, I followed the installation instruction on the Arch Linux wiki:
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginners’_Guide

After transferring to USB using UNetBootIn, I have to change the USB drive label to ARCH_201005, otherwise it will display the following message:

(Click to enlarge)

To change the label, type “palimpsest” (without quote) in the terminal. Select the USB device on the left. Make sure to unmount the driver first, and then click the “Edit Filesystem Label” button to change the drive label to ARCH_201005.

And since I have both 64-bit laptop and 32-bit netbook, I downloaded the dual ISO which contains both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of the OS. After I copied the files to the USB drive through UNetBootIn and booted into the boot menu, the 32-bit and 64-bit selection items have no effect. The only option that works is the first “Default” one which is the 32-bit version. Because I want to install it on my 64bit-based laptop, I tried to figure out how to install the 64-bit version of Arch Linux. After looking into the boot options by press the tab key at the boot menu, I found out that all of the boot image files for each architecture are in the /boot folder. I also noticed that the working “Default” one is based on the two files in the root directory: ubninit and ubnkern. I think that these files are the same as the ones in the /boot/i636/ folder. Therefore I renamed these files with .32 extension and copied the only two files in the /boot/x86_64/ folder to the root directory with the same names as the ones with .32 extension. I then copied and renamed these files to the root directory with .64 extension for backup purpose. In the end, here is my current files in the root directory of the USB device:

(Click to enlarge)

Note that the two files without any extension (ubninit and ubnkern) are 64-bit files. I could delete them and replace with the .32 extension files in the near future once I decide to install Arch Linux on my netbook.

Since I was installing on the laptop, I have no wired Internet connection. I had to first connect to the Internet by using ifconfig, iwconfig, and dhcpcd utilities before the installation. Also, according to the wiki, I have to execute “dmesg | grep firmware” command in order to find out and install the appropriate wireless firmware during the installation.

Once I installed Arch Linux, I needed to solve the wireless auto-connection issue. Thanks to the netcfg wiki (https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Network_Profiles#Connecting_automatically), I quickly solved the issue. One last thing that I’ve done is to remove the network daemon in the DAEMONS section of /etc/rc.conf file since I have loaded net-profiles daemon and I think the net-profiles daemon has the same usage as the network daemon.

After I installed GNOME and Compiz, I noticed the title bar on all the windows were missing once I enabled Compiz through fusion-icon. Thanks for the tip on the Arch Linux forum (https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=96991), I was able to regain the title bar. The solution is easy: open the ccsm (CompizConfig Settings Manager) and enable the Window Decoration plugin under the Effects section (make sure to enable Move Window and Resize Window plugins under Window Management section as well since they are basic window interaction elements). I also noticed that unlike Ubuntu and other similar distributions, all the Compiz plugins in Arch Linux are disabled by default since I installed GNOME from scratch.

The following are the reference sources that helped me during the installation:

If you have other tips on the Arch Linux installation and configuration process, please share them in the comments below.

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ISO Master – An Useful ISO Creator and Editor for GNU/Linux

Posted on October 30, 2010 by robbychen

If you are following my Twitter, identi.ca, or Facebook feed recently, you knew that I’m currently switching to Arch Linux on my laptop since I don’t like Unity to be the default UI for Ubuntu 11.04. Besides, I already lost interest with Ubuntu 10.10. This post is based on the upcoming post about my Arch Linux installation experience.

When I was installing Arch Linux, I have to change the ISO label in order to reproduce the following error message inside VirtualBox:

(Click to enlarge)

I never changed label for an ISO file in GNU/Linux. So I googled a bit and found an useful tool for creating and editing ISO files called ISO Master. It is on the Softpedia website, which is a software download and review site. Unfortunately, I don’t think this tool is in any of the GNU/Linux repositories. This means that I have to compile and install it myself. Surprisingly, after I downloaded the source file, the compiling and installing process went smoothly without any error.

After the installation was finished, I launched ISO Master from the Sound & Video application menu. The UI is clean and easy to navigate. I opened downloaded Arch Linux image file and click File → Properties. I then changed its volume name and saved as a new ISO. Thanks to this useful utility, I was able to reproduce the above screenshot, as well as my operation with ISO files in the future.

For the complete review of ISO Master, read the article on Softpedia: http://www.softpedia.com/reviews/linux/ISO-Master-Review-50543.shtml

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Linux could improve Computer Skills

Posted on March 24, 2010 by robbychen

Since I switched to GNU/Linux, I always believed that I could improve my programming skills by using this open source Operating System. I’m still believing this beliefs until now. However, after nearly two years of using GNU/Linux, my programming skills doesn’t even increase a bit. But my creativity seems to be improved and I have gotten a lot of inspirations from using GNU/Linux Operating System.

I came across an article from DaniWeb today that talks about how is Linux a good teacher. It advises me to always use command line in order to actually improve my programming skills with Linux. I remembered that when I was a Fedora user, I always used command line to install new software packages. However, after I have switched to Kubuntu, I had used less and less command line. Mainly because the package installation command is different from Fedora. After I read the article, I have decided that I need to begin to use command line frequently in order to learn from multiple Linux distros as well as to improve my programming skills.

Since I heard about the existence of Linux three years ago, I have searched around online to find a suitable Linux distro to begin my programming skills improvement. However, because of my inexperience of GNU/Linux, I chose to using Fedora as my first Linux distro. I continued to search for the Linux distros for improve my programing skills while using Fedora as my main OS. The following Linux distros I’ve found so far that I think it’s useful to begin with:

  • LFS (Linux From Scratch)
  • Arch Linux
  • BSDs (FreeBSD, OpenBSD, etc)

Currently, I’m trying to install Arch Linux on my netbook by following the tutorials on its official website. I also plan to finishing reading the LFS ebook and apply the technique in the book to my test desktop machine. In addition, I will also try to download, test, and learn various BSD distros in VirtualBox.