These types of posts are often more harfmul than helpful. ArchLinux already has proper installation instructions and those who cannot follow them aren't recommend to run it. The main installation issues the ArchLinux forum sees is from people following outdated third party installation guides.
I think the post title is understated, since I had a related thought: it's not hard to install most Linux distros on a laptop, and this post will intimidate people.
This post is about how one person did it on hard mode, to get it just how they want it. That's fine.
I suspect that most of the people on HN could pretty easily install Debian, without documentation (just write this file raw to a USB flash drive, boot the laptop from it, and mostly accept the defaults from the menus):
The Debian example is relevant to my point that I think this article will intimidate people who don't already know Linux (but over the years have heard that it's a pain to get working on laptops, etc.).
Launch the guided archinstall is the comfortable mode, 2/3 of the article are done automatically through option selects at the beginning, and one installs Arch within two minutes. A configuration file can be saved also.
The archinstall command/script doesn't (yet?) implement disk sector-size selection and some of the other relevant details of the article, but the introduction of this installation mode within Arch makes life easier, besides do not intimidate people.
It is a notoriously big leap in the direction of usability, IMHO this is a path to follow (one of the paths to follow).
PS:
The article uses yay to install the DE. I think the article should have commented the difference between Core, Extra and AUR packages.
At least in the case of NVMe disks, changing the LBA format does not seem to increase performance, and more importantly, in some cases could degrade the random read-write speed for just increasing sequential a little (bad thing, random read-write it is more important that sequential for a SO).
In theory the mainboard will select the appropriate format for the NVMe disk.
Just as an example, this guide suddenly assumes that "yay" is installed. Even though AUR helpers like yay aren't officially recommended by ArchLinux and also aren't trivial to install.
The design decisions around AUR befuddle me to this day. It's utterly arcane in how to use it. Or rather it feels like it wasn't designed at all and simply evolved.
I highly recommend people to use "yay" and similar helpers that make a lot of the problems simply go away.
The AUR makes either perfect sense or no sense depending on what you think it is. If you think it's an extra repo with more software, then it's a bit odd: Why no binaries? Why the antagonistic view of AUR helpers? Heck, why doesn't pacman just have an option to automatically use the AUR? Just add it as another repo next to extra. On the other hand, there's another viewpoint, where the AUR is what happens if you provide a free-form place for random users to post build scripts. Not packages, really, just "here's the commands I used to build this software on Arch". In that view, you're not expecting a streamlined experience, and binaries are a ridiculous idea; you grab someone's notes, read them over, and if they seem reasonable enough then you execute them (because the notes came in executable format). Or if they don't quite look right, you edit them into shape and then run them, and that's expected because this is just a way for a bunch of hackers to pass around suggested build steps.
And to be clear, I think the AUR certainly started as the second thing, but it's often viewed as the first, and maybe it even should be the first thing. But if you assume it came from the second option then all its design choices make sense.
It's really only meaningfully used as the first thing by virtually anyone.
Arch's whole identity as a distro is that of a coworker who is capable and competent at all the most useful aspects of his job whilst being completely useless at things which ultimately don't matter so you ignore his body odor, taste in music, and mismatched socks.
Nobody obtains security by watching the package script flash through their terminal just like nobody gains anything useful by doing a manual install at the terminal. These don't matter because you can use a script to install arch and use a helper script the same way you use apt.
> I think the AUR certainly started as the second thing, but it's often viewed as the first, and maybe it even should be the first thing. But if you assume it came from the second option then all its design choices make sense.
People who cite the AUR as a major reason to use or prefer Arch (which seems to be a lot) definitely see it and use it as the former. If it's not that, pretty much all of the package availability arguments in favor of Arch disappear.
(Which is fine— I don't think package availability arguments are very good when it comes to distro selection in general, except for non-technical people and absolute noobs.)
I've always thought it was more for developers. You can get something into AUR easily, and it is basically the basis for a real package.
So low effort for developers.
Meanwhile I think the high effort for users of AUR is an appropriate barrier to entry.
Every dangerous thing I've seen in life benefits from good situational awareness, and all the "learn makepkg" stuff plus "can't be root" seems to match the learning effort to the risk.
I think it's great. You clone a git repository which is amazing since you can just pull in new commits to get updates. Then you read and understand the PKGBUILD. When you are satisfied that it's not malware, you basically just run makepkg and it does everything. Then you vote on the package so that it's more likely to be included in the official repositories in the future.
Depends on what you mean by "community". There used to be a repository named "community", it is now called "extra" and it is indeed an official repository.
It is maintained by a group of trusted users who need to be sponsored by at least two other maintainers. This creates a web of trust rooted at the Arch Linux developers.
The Arch User Repository is what I consider to be a "community" repository. It is essentially the programming language package manager model. You create an account and push whatever packagers you want.
I have no issue doing Arch installations by hand, but sometimes it’s nice to save time when you don’t have any special configurations. That being said, knowing how to do installations manually has been pivotal in me knowing how to recover borked Linux systems.
The post by itself is not harmful, since it can be that the person posted it for their own blog because they like to write for themselves. Someone now finding it and using it for their own benefit/loss, that's a problem.
I learned the arch linux installation from the arch web page. I've stepped through it probably 50 times over the years to install various systems.
It becomes this "choose your own adventure" style installation, and you quite quickly get worn down by the branches and start making expedient choices over more involved choices.
So many of my laptop installs have had simple partitions, systemd boot, and on and on and ending with a text login.
Each choice for a more capable system would require extensive learning and the risk of having to start over.
These instructions take you through complex choices like secure boot, LVM, choosing a desktop, a graphical boot and more.
This installation guide gives you a fully functioning system (like you would get with a full distribtion).
The author had to learn from a fully-functional manjaro install, and then walked us through the same thing with arch.
Having a full desktop os with arch in the end is a really wonderful goal, and might be worth the risk of having problems with the install (which I seem to get with arch anyway)
these days I ask chatgpt for help to install arch instead of using the docs which are designed as a gate keeping mechanism to discourage the uninitiated by making them feel stupid.
chatgpt just tells you how to do and turns out its really not that hard.
I actually agree that the Arch docs are absolutely excellent in their level of detail, precision and helpfulness. I also think its possible for them to simultaneously be a gate keeping mechanism and stand by what I said
Gatekeeping is an active effort to keep others out of something (out of a field, away from information, etc.). Where is the active effort to keep people out of Arch when the documentation is made available for free?
I think you're talking past the person you're replying to.
Not sure why you use the word "active", as it's unnecessary. Gatekeeping is just erecting barriers of whatever sort in an effort to keep people out. Making install documentation that is very very detailed to the point that some people will be turned off by it and go away could very much be considered gatekeeping. Even if that documentation is objectively good documentation.
Obviously we can't know the motives of the people who wrote the documentation. But it's fair to look at the docs and believe that the authors are engaging in gatekeeping. That belief might be wrong, but there's no evidence either way. Unless the authors have come out and said something about this topic, of course. And even then, it depends on if you believe what they've said.
It's subjective.
(I personally have no dog in this race. I don't use or particularly care about Arch; Debian suits me just fine. My main experience with Arch is positive, though: their wiki is amazing, and when I search for answers for various questions about Linux and Linux desktop software, the Arch wiki comes up very often, and is nearly always helpful.)
> Making install documentation that is very very detailed to the point that some people will be turned off by it and go away could very much be considered gatekeeping.
In my times, we called such people lazy. No gatekeeping needed.
I haven't had that feeling. In fact, installing Arch Linux is easy. The hardest part is the bad partition editor UX and that you need to have an understanding of how UEFI booting works. There is also the problem of GRUB being a terrible bootloader, but that is another story for another day.
The install wiki is full of outdated information that causes people to install outdated and old methods of doing things. So I wouldn't advise people to use it, other than the fact there's no other option.
I find that hard to believe. I've always found the Arch Wiki to be excellent and very up to date. Do you have any examples of articles which document outdated ways to do things?
If you have found incorrect information, please edit the wiki to improve it.
