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03-29-2005, 05:13 AM
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#1
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Member
Registered: Oct 2004
Location: Kazakhstan
Distribution: Slackware
Posts: 48
Rep:
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Does Arch Linux worth checking out ?
Hello Guys,
I'm writing this message using my slackware 10.1 distro as main for myself these days.
But I've tried several distros by this time:
ALT Linux(Russian Distro)
Gentoo
Knoppix
Slackware which I love for it's simplicity...
I/m still looking forward to try as much distros as possible, cause people are always looking for new things in their life...but anyway, I'd like to ask a couple of questions in regards to the Arch Linux, hoping for this distro users:
- How can check the contents of the certain release ? (0.7 for Instance) for each version - base & full one ?
- I do not have possibility to download unlimited packages from the Internet & stay connected forever like Gentoo requires to do for Instance & I need universal distro which can be used both for day-to-day work & for Programming - will Arch suit my needs ?
- How can I get bleeding edge software with Arch linux - Are there a sort of current ISOs snapshots like in slackware ?
- I'm planning to upgrade my machine to 64 Processor type one, will I be able to install Arch on this ?
Thanks,
Sader.
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03-29-2005, 06:36 AM
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#2
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Member
Registered: Mar 2004
Location: Darkest Oxfordshire
Distribution: Arch, Slackware
Posts: 184
Rep:
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Re: Does Arch Linux worth checking out ?
Quote:
Quoth Sader:
How can I check the contents of the certain release ? (0.7 for Instance) for each version - base & full one ?
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A complete list of packages included on the 0.7 CD can be found on the Arch website:
http://www.archlinux.org/pkglist.php?r=0.7
Quote:
Quoth Sader:
I do not have possibility to download unlimited packages from the Internet & stay connected forever like Gentoo requires to do for Instance
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If you want the latest versions of everything, and especially if you want to use KDE or GNOME (which aren't on the CD), then you'll probably find yourself downloading quite a lot of stuff getting your system set up to start with. After that, you'll only need to be connected when downloading new packages.
Quote:
Quoth Sader:
I need universal distro which can be used both for day-to-day work & for Programming - will Arch suit my needs?
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Provided you're willing to spend a bit of time getting it set up right and getting used to it, you should be able to mould an Arch installation into anything (within reason) you need it to be. Certainly Arch can be a generic day-to-day workhorse, or a programming platform if you want.
Quote:
Quoth Sader:
How can I get bleeding edge software with Arch linux - Are there a sort of current ISOs snapshots like in slackware ?
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The numbered releases don't really mean much; they're essentially a snapshot of the current packageset at the time of release. The packages available are updated more or less continuously, and pacman, the package manager, will use the latest versions by default.
Quote:
Quoth Sader:
I'm planning to upgrade my machine to 64 Processor type one, will I be able to install Arch on this ?
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I'm pretty sure Arch would work on an ix86_64, but since its only compiled for 32-bit processors, it won't be able to take full advantage of the processor's 64-bit features without some recompiling work.
It sounds like you're not afrad to try different distros, so I would suggest giving it a go and seeing if you like it. The worst that can happen is that you don't like it and delete it. I only recently made the switch from Slackware myself, and I'm very happy with it.
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03-29-2005, 07:02 AM
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#3
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Member
Registered: Oct 2004
Location: Kazakhstan
Distribution: Slackware
Posts: 48
Original Poster
Rep:
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Appreciated for your comments. I think I'll give a try to Arch linux.
Any Idea When next release will be available ? I think I'll go with the base package & just add additional ones separately...
Also pls advise if it is possible to download the binaries separately, then get them installed on different machine without internet connection - I'm sure that could be done, just want to confirm that once more.
Thanks,
Sader
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03-29-2005, 05:00 PM
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#4
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Senior Member
Registered: Apr 2004
Location: Surprise, AZ
Distribution: Debian | CentOS | Arch
Posts: 1,103
Rep:
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Sader, Arch linux is a metadistribution (or rolling distribution) in that the version numbers are just periodic snapshots.
You could use the install CD from version .4 and a simple 'pacman -Syu' will bring you totally up to date... NICE!!!
anyways... it's definitely worth checking out.. I personally use the 'full' CD and choose 'everything' on it.. it really isn't too much.. less than 500 MB... doesn't include KDEor GNOME or anything... it does install X with fluxbox, windowmaker, etc.. MPlayer, Xine, XMMS, and someother handy apps.. I especially like that it includes MPlayer right off the bat..'cause it's always such a pain to get setup right.. not in arch though... i think you'll like it.. make sure you read up on 'hwd' as well.. use hwd to makew your xorg.conf file.. best hardware detection I've seen on any Linux...
Good Luck! 
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03-29-2005, 07:07 PM
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#5
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Member
Registered: Mar 2004
Location: Darkest Oxfordshire
Distribution: Arch, Slackware
Posts: 184
Rep:
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Quote:
Originally posted by Sader
Any Idea When next release will be available?
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I've no idea, but I shouldn't worry about it. The 0.7 CD is fairly up-to-date, at least if you stick with the 'Base' packages, and upgrading them once you've got a barebones system installed is pretty trivial.
Quote:
Originally posted by Sader
I think I'll go with the base package & just add additional ones separately...
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Not a bad idea. I started by installing the base packages (minus DevFS, which is obsolete, and GRUB, because I prefer Lilo and saw no reason to install both), updating them with pacman -Syu, and then adding the other stuff I wanted. I think this is the 'standard' recommended approach.
Quote:
Originally posted by Sader
Also pls advise if it is possible to download the binaries separately, then get them installed on different machine without internet connection
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No problem. Grab them from here, or one of the mirrors.
Last edited by AxelFendersson; 03-29-2005 at 07:08 PM.
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04-03-2005, 02:01 PM
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#6
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Member
Registered: Oct 2004
Location: Kazakhstan
Distribution: Slackware
Posts: 48
Original Poster
Rep:
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Yep guys, ARCH Linux is definetelly worh checking out.
I'm writing this message from My Arch Linux distribution that I installed at home. It is absolutely AWESOME !!!
I'll set up one at my work place tomorrow...
Thanks to everyone
Sader
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04-03-2005, 10:26 PM
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#7
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Member
Registered: May 2004
Location: USA
Distribution: #1 PCLinuxOS -- for laughs -> Ubuntu, Suse, Mepis
Posts: 315
Rep:
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Well .. I just spent the day messing with it so I suggest you take another look.
My experience .. (may be I caused some trouble by compiling the kernel .. but that's very minor port and unlikely..
First the install is curses based .. not a crime but the menu's are quiet brain-dead ..
i built the kernel and may be saw more brain-dead behvior than most peple see, but there are bigger problems
Couldn't find mouse .. I swear (didn't have a device /dev/mouse) .. I had to hand edit the darn thing .. made it work finally.
Didn't find my display card (made that work by hand too)
Has no options for monitors ..
I didn't even get to finiding issues with sound ..
Disks are named starangely .. one can get over it .. but can;'t get over the fact that everyone is trying to be LFS complaint and this distros is way out on the left field.
It starts with a crummy WM and DE .. so I decieded to get KDE . welll it's 214MB and it took 2+ hours to get that down from the slow mirros .. and get this ..pacman has a perl-script to "sort the mirrors" based on the speed, but ohwell .. that script has a dependency and you have to first download !!! I can't believe they won't include that 2 bit package in the base ..
talking of that .. the base package is missiing quiet a few things lke k3b and plenty other useful things.
The real problem I finally gave up on it was that I couldn't resolve one error in kdeinit .. KDE started up and i could use it abit , but for some reason a couple of libs (libkdeui.so.4) had some unresolved references (that kdeinit) asked for .. and barfed.
For all the beauty of pacman I couldn't make it tell me which package had this darned librayary .
Their web-site claims a bug in pacman causes menu-items missing, so unintttall and reinstall kde ..which i did before saying hell with it.
Yes it starts fast and even KDE comes up fast .. but DOESNT WORK RIGHT ..
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04-03-2005, 11:28 PM
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#8
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Member
Registered: Jan 2005
Location: Boston
Distribution: slackware
Posts: 502
Rep:
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I installed this distro half out of my mind on cheap vodka and synthetic dopamine reuptake inhibitors - Maybe that's why it's running so well - It certanily helps to be high during the installation process.
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04-04-2005, 12:59 AM
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#9
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LQ Newbie
Registered: Feb 2005
Distribution: Archlinux 0.7
Posts: 24
Rep:
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Quote:
Originally posted by Sader
Yep guys, ARCH Linux is definetelly worh checking out.
It is absolutely AWESOME !!!
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Yeah, I'd have to agree with you there 
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04-04-2005, 07:09 AM
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#10
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Member
Registered: Mar 2004
Location: Darkest Oxfordshire
Distribution: Arch, Slackware
Posts: 184
Rep:
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Quote:
Originally posted by winsnomore
Disks are named strangely...
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Easily fixed (Although I would like to see udev become the default). And apparently, Gentoo has the same problem.
Last edited by AxelFendersson; 04-04-2005 at 07:10 AM.
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04-04-2005, 08:59 AM
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#11
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Senior Member
Registered: Apr 2004
Location: Surprise, AZ
Distribution: Debian | CentOS | Arch
Posts: 1,103
Rep:
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"talking of that .. the base package is missiing quiet a few things lke k3b and plenty other useful things."
??? lol... ArchLinux is meant to be bare, stripped down, and fast.. and I don't know what you're issues are with the mirrors.. I generally justuse the archlinux.org mirror and I get about > 450KB/s downstream... it's not intended to have god hardware detection.. you should know the modules yourself and add them to load on boot.. however, there is hotplug AND hwd, which is one of the best hardware recognition tools around.. 'pacman -S hwd' then run 'hwd -s' and it will give you many things.. one of which is an autogenerated xorg.conf file named 'xorg.conf.hwd' in /etc/X11 Look it over, and if looks good..copy it over..
I don't know why you had such problems.. perhaps you didn't read anydocumentation on it before the instalation??
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04-04-2005, 11:27 AM
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#12
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Member
Registered: May 2004
Location: USA
Distribution: #1 PCLinuxOS -- for laughs -> Ubuntu, Suse, Mepis
Posts: 315
Rep:
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Guys .. stripped down doesn't mean unusable, are you saying cd burning tools are not necessary .. I guess K3b was bad example
considering it needs Kde, but why shouldn't some basic (and good) tools be part of the package.
I got on the average 40KB/sec download speed on the kde setup .. on Debian mirrors I have gotten > 500KB/sec .. so it's not my network connection.
and I can't understand putting the comment in the pacman.conf to optimize the mirrors and then not provide the package to help you do that ...
that's surely not smart (and I guess I don't have to read documentation to figure that out).
Having not so good hardware detection is NOT a good thing .. if tit's available in all other (good)distro's then taking it 10 years back doesn't do anyone any good.
I have no idea why do you want to defend this issue .. it's a so so distro .. meant as a play thing and not a serious one ..has inconsistencies and a non-standard fs to boot.
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04-04-2005, 12:14 PM
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#13
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Senior Member
Registered: Apr 2004
Location: Surprise, AZ
Distribution: Debian | CentOS | Arch
Posts: 1,103
Rep:
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it has a very standard FS.. udev is the new standard.. so get used to it.. to not use hardware detection is meant for increasing speed and boot times.. if you tell it to only use a handfull of modules and it autoloads them at boot time, then you don't wait for hotplug to do all of it's crap..
I don't know what your problem is with connection to the mirrors.. but it shouldn't be that slow.. cd burning tools are not a necessity because not all computers include a CD burner.. why do you need a cd burning tool if all you have is a cdrom?? the point of the distro is to give you a very small base with which to take it in any direction you like.. it's the same theory with Gentoo.. get a simple base, and go from there..
As for kernel compilation..I always use the standard arch kernel, as it is very optimized and supports everything I have on my system..
If you don't like arch.. I don't care.. it works well for me.. very fast, very stable, very usable.... this is OSS.. the choice is yours.. 
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04-04-2005, 01:17 PM
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#14
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Member
Registered: May 2004
Location: USA
Distribution: #1 PCLinuxOS -- for laughs -> Ubuntu, Suse, Mepis
Posts: 315
Rep:
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I thought everyone was converging of LFS .. arch surely is not LFS compliant .. I don't know what udev is .
Boot time is not the "ONLY" thing. let's crap the hardware detection for speed .. well this is new to me
I felt adventureous and decided to complie, and it did work withouy a problem, I don't think hardware detection had anything to with "my kernel".
The problem of the inconsistenciesbetween "X" and the kernel exists irrespecive.
CD wrriters are the only way to back up stuff these days, its a necessity in linux world where you are juggling distro's you want to try, distro's you want to chuck out ... and still keep a working env.
Hey all power to you if you like it, I just wanted to put my experience with it.
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04-04-2005, 02:17 PM
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#15
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Senior Member
Registered: Apr 2004
Location: Surprise, AZ
Distribution: Debian | CentOS | Arch
Posts: 1,103
Rep:
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Quote:
Originally posted by winsnomore
CD wrriters are the only way to back up stuff these days, its a necessity in linux world where you are juggling distro's you want to try, distro's you want to chuck out ... and still keep a working env.
Hey all power to you if you like it, I just wanted to put my experience with it.
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I thought that's why it's always recommended to keep /home a separate partition, that way you keep all user files/settings, regardless of the distro you're using??  hehe.. anyways.. sorry you didn't have a good experience with it.. if you ever decide to try it again..be sure to pop into #archlinux and ask for help... we're a very friendly community.. 
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