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Install a Phundrak-flavored Arch Linux

Introduction

Here will be presented what I do to get my system up and running on a fresh Arch Linux install. These installation instructions were written in order to get an Arch Linux distribution up and running with the same configuration as my main computers and my travelling laptops configuration.

Install Arch Linux

I usually install Arch from the vanilla ISO, however I began using archfi to install easily the distro (Ive done it so many times, I know how it works now). Usually, my distros will be installed on at least two partitions, one dedicated to /home, the other to the root partition /.

If the computer supports EFI bootloaders, the EFI partition will be mounted on /boot. I generally use rEFInd as my boot manager, but if you are more comfortable with another one, just install what you want. Be aware that if you format your /boot partition, you will delete all boot managers that already exist; so, if you are dual-booting, DO NOT FORMAT IT. Yes, I made the mistake of wiping the Windows boot manager.

The swap partition is always at least 4GB large, and I should have a total of 12GB of combined RAM and swap. This means on my main computer I have 16GB of RAM and 4GB of swap, but on my thinkpad I have 4GB of RAM and 8GB of swap.

Get the latest live system with fast mirrors

When you boot into the live ISO, execute the following command:

  pacman -Sy reflector
  reflector -c France -c Germany -l 200 -p http -p https --sort rate \
            --save /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist --verbose

This will update the packages from your live ISO, and you will get the best mirrors for your installation. Of course, change the countries accordingly to your location.

Install the system

Then you can use a custom script to ease your installation of Arch if you do not wish to do it manually. Personally, Ive done it several times already, I know how the distro works, I just want to be able to install my distro quickly now.

  wget archfi.sf.net/archfi
  # Or from matmoul.github.io/archfi if SourceForge is down
  sh archfi

Then, follow the instructions and install Arch Linux. Take the opportunity to install as many packages as you need, mainly yay which I use as my package manager (it is just a wrapper for pacman) and AUR helper, and pacman-contrib which will help us installing some packages later.

Once your system is installed, reboot and remove your installation media from your computer.

Install basic packages

We will need some basic packages in order to run the bootstrap file. So, lets install fish (our shell running the script) and git.

  sudo pacman -Sy fish git yadm

Execute bootstrap

yadm comes with a very handy feature: its bootstrap script. We can execute it by running the following command:

  yadm bootstrap

Notice these two header files, we can see this is a fish script, hence why we need fish (which is my daily shell anyway).

  #!/usr/bin/fish
  # -*- mode: fish -*-

Lets take a look at what it does.

Decrypt private yadm files

Some private files are stored encrypted in the repository of my yadm dotfiles. I will need them later on during the bootstrap execution.

yadm decrypt

Get a correct keyboard layout

I use mainly the bépo layout, a French keyboard layout inspired by Dvorak layouts, however I sometimes need to switch back to the standard French AZERTY or the American QWERTY layout, so I make it so the Menu key switches for me my layout between these three. This makes it so my xorg configuration of my keyboard looks like this:

  set keyboardconf \
  'Section "InputClass"
          Identifier "system-keyboard"
          MatchIsKeyboard "on"
          Option "XkbLayout" "fr,fr,us"
          Option "XkbModel" "pc104"
          Option "XkbVariant" "bepo,,"
          Option "XkbOptions" "grp:menu_toggle"
  EndSection'

So, lets set it as our keyboard configuration.

  printf "\n# Set keyboard layout #########################################################\n\n"
  echo $keyboardconf | sudo tee /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/00-keyboard.conf

Set our locale

I use two main locales, the French and US UTF-8 locales, and I like to keep the Japanese locale activated just in case.

  set mylocales "en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8" "fr_FR.UTF-8 UTF-8" "ja_JP.UTF-8 UTF-8"

Lets enable these.

  printf "\n# Set our locale ##############################################################\n\n"
  for item in $mylocales
      if test (grep -e "#$item" /etc/locale.gen)
          sudo sed -i "/$item/s/^#//g" /etc/locale.gen
      end
  end

This is my configuration I usually use when it comes to my locale.

  set localeconf "LANG=en_US.UTF-8
  LC_COLLATE=C
  LC_NAME=fr_FR.UTF-8
  LC_NUMERIC=fr_FR.UTF-8
  LC_IDENTIFICATION=fr_FR.UTF-8
  LC_TELEPHONE=fr_FR.UTF-8
  LC_MONETARY=fr_FR.UTF-8
  LC_PAPER=fr_FR.UTF-8
  LC_ADDRESS=fr_FR.UTF-8
  LC_TIME=fr_FR.UTF-8
  LC_MEASUREMENT=fr_FR.UTF-8"

Lets set it as our systems locale.

  echo $localeconf | sudo tee /etc/locale.conf

Now we can generate our locale!

  printf "\n# Generate locale #############################################################\n\n"
  sudo locale-gen

Create some folders

Lets create some folders we might need for mounting our drives, Android devices and CDs.

  printf "\n# Create directories for mounting #############################################\n\n"
  sudo mkdir -p /mnt/{USB,CD,Android}
  sudo chown $USER:(id -g $USER) /mnt/{USB,CD,Android}

We also need the following folder for our nano backups.

  mkdir -p $HOME/.cache/nano/backups

Set users shell to fish

First of all, the bootstrap shell will set the users shell to fish.

  printf "\n# Set fish as the default shell ###############################################\n\n"
  chsh -s /usr/bin/fish

Install yay if it isnt already installed

Now well need to be sure yay, our AUR helper, is installed on our system. If it is, we dont need to to anything. However, if it isnt, well install it manually.

  if ! test (which yay)
      printf "\n# Installing yay ##############################################################\n\n"
      cd
      mkdir -p fromGIT
      cd fromGIT
      git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/yay.git
      cd yay
      makepkg -si --noconfirm
  else
      printf "\n# yay already installed #######################################################\n\n"
  end

Install basic packages

Lets set in a custom varible what packages well be needing.

  set PACKAGES

  acpilight adobe-source-han-sans-jp-fonts asar ascii aspell-en aspell-fr assimp \
  awesome-terminal-fonts base-devel bat biber bleachbit bluez-firmware \
  bluez-utils bookworm boost bzip2 ccls chicken chromium clisp compton cppcheck \
  cppreference cppreference-devhelp cpupower cronie cryptsetup device-mapper \
  diffutils discord-canary discount ditaa dmenu dmenu-lpass docker \
  docker-compose dockerfile-language-server-bin doxygen dunst dwarffortress \
  emacs exfat-utils farbfeld feh ffmpegthumbnailer findutils firefox flake8 \
  font-mathematica fontforge freeglut fzf gcc-libs gdb gimp glibc \
  gnome-disk-utility gnome-epub-thumbnailer gnu-free-fonts gnuplot go-tools \
  golangci-lint-bin graphviz htop i3-gaps i3lock-blur i3status igdm-bin \
  inetutils j4-dmenu-desktop javascript-typescript-langserver js-beautify \
  jfsutils jmtpfs lastpass-cli less linux-headers lldb logrotate lvm2 ly-git \
  meson minted mpc mpd mpd-rich-presence-discord-git mpv mupdf-tools nano ncdu \
  ncmpcpp nemo-fileroller nemo-preview neofetch neovim netctl networkmanager \
  networkmanager-openvpn nm-connection-editor nnn nodejs-vmd nomacs nordvpn-bin \
  noto-fonts-emoji npm ntfs-3g numlockx openssh otf-fandol otf-ipafont p7zip \
  pacman-contrib pandoc-bin pavucontrol pciutils pcurses pdfpc polybar prettier \
  pulseaudio-bluetooth python-autoflake python-envtpl-git python-epc \
  python-importmagic python-language-server python-nose python-pip python-ptvsd \
  python-pytest python-pywal qt5-imageformats qemu r raw-thumbnailer reflector \
  rofi rofi-wifi-menu-git rsync rtv rustup s-nail samba scrot sent shadow \
  siji-git simplescreenrecorder speedcrunch sshfs st-luke-git swi-prolog \
  texlive-bin texlive-langchinese texlive-langcyrillic texlive-langgreek \
  texlive-langjapanese texlive-langkorean texlive-latexextra \
  texlive-localmanager-git texlive-most tmux tree ttf-arphic-uming ttf-baekmuk \
  ttf-bitstream-vera ttf-dejavu ttf-google-fonts-opinionated-git ttf-hanazono \
  ttf-joypixels ttf-koruri ttf-liberation ttf-material-design-icons-git \
  ttf-monapo ttf-mplus ttf-ms-fonts ttf-sazanami ttf-symbola ttf-tibetan-machine \
  ttf-twemoji-color ttf-unifont ttf-vlgothic typescript \
  typescript-language-server-bin unicode unicode-emoji unrar usbutils valgrind \
  vscode-css-languageserver-bin vscode-html-languageserver-bin w3m wget \
  x11-ssh-askpass xclip xdg-user-dirs-gtk xfsprogs xorg-apps xorg-drivers \
  xorg-server xorg-xinit xss-lock xvkbd yaml-language-server-bin yapf

These are the minimum I would have in my own installation. You can edit it however you want. Lets install those.

  printf "\n# Installing needed packages ##################################################\n\n"
  sudo pacman -Syu
  yay -S --needed $PACKAGES

Setting up Emacs: Installing Spacemacs

Now, the first thing we want to do with Emacs is install its Spacemacs distribution. Well clone its develop branch into ~/.emacs.d. We need to do this prior to our dotfiles cloning because of some submodules that are cloned within our ~/.emacs.d directory, and git wont let us clone Spacemacs in an already existing and non-empty directory. To make sure it isnt one, lets delete any potentially existing ~/.emacs.d directory:

  printf "\n# Installing Spacemacs ########################################################\n\n"
  rm -rf ~/.emacs.d

Now we can clone Spacemacs:

  git clone --single-branch --branch develop https://github.com/syl20bnr/spacemacs ~/.emacs.d

And we can restore what might have been deleted in our ~/.emacs.d/private directory:

  yadm checkout -- ~/.emacs.d/private/

Set up dotfiles

Update our dotfiles remotes

This line in the bootstrap script will test if the current user is using my username. If yes, its probably me.

  if ! test (echo "phundrak" | sed -e "s/^.*$USER//I")

If it is me installing and using these dotfiles, I want the remotes of my dotfiles to be set to ssh remotes using my ssh keys.

  printf "\n# Update yadms remotes #######################################################\n\n"
  yadm remote set-url origin git@labs.phundrak.com:phundrak/dotfiles.git
  yadm remote add github git@github.com:phundrak/dotfiles.git

I will also want to decrypt my encrypted files, such as said ssh keys.

  printf "\n# Decrypt encrypted dotfiles ##################################################\n\n"
  yadm decrypt

Finally, lets close this if statement.

  end

Get envtpl

Before we set our dotfiles up, lets make sure envtpl is correctly installed. This package will be needed for generating our alt dotfiles.

  printf '\n# Install envtpl ##############################################################\n\n'
  yay -Syu python-envtpl-git

Update our submodules

Now we can download the various dependencies of our dotfiles. To do so, lets run the following command:

  printf "\n# Getting yadm susbmodules ####################################################\n\n"
  yadm submodule update --init --recursive

Generate our alt files

Now this should be the last manipulation on our dotfiles: lets create our alternate files:

  printf "\n# Generating alt files ########################################################\n\n"
  yadm alt

Installing Tryones Compton fork

For some reason, I found installing directly this fork does not work, and I need to install it after I installed the regular compton packages. compton-tryone-git will replace compton which will be removed.

  printf "\n# Installing tryones compton fork ############################################\n\n"
  yay -S compton-tryone-git

Enable some of our services

We have installed some packages which require some services to run. Lets enable them.

Docker

First, lets activate Docker.

  printf "\n# Enabling and starting Docker ################################################\n\n"
  sudo systemctl enable --now docker

Now, if we wish it, we can be added to the docker group so we wont have to type sudo each time we call Docker or Docker Compose.

  read --prompt "echo 'Do you wish to be added to the `docker` group? (Y/n): ' " -l adddockergroup
  if test $adddockergroup = 'y' || test $adddockergroup = "Y" || test $adddockergroup = ''
      sudo usermod -aG docker $USER
  end

Emacs

Emacs will run as a user service, which means it wont be launched until we log in.

  printf "\n# Enabling Emacs as user service ##############################################\n\n"
  systemctl --user enable --now emacs

SSH server

Maybe we want to activate an SSH server on our machine. If so, we can enable it. Lets ask the question.

  read --prompt "echo 'Do you want to activate the ssh server? (Y/n): ' " -l sshdserver
  if test $sshdserver = 'y' || test $sshdserver = "Y" || test $sshdserver = ''
      printf "\n# Enabling ssh server #########################################################\n\n"
      sudo systemctl enable --now sshd
  end

Ly

Ly is a display manager based on ncurses which I find nice enough for me to use (I generally dont like using display managers). Lets enable it, and lets disable tty2 while were at it (Ly uses it to run X).

  sudo systemctl enable --now ly
  sudo systemctl disable getty@tty2

Acpilight

acpilight is our utility managing the brightness of our screen. There is actually no service to enable here, but we must ensure the user is part of the video group so we can modify the brightness of our screen without using sudo.

  sudo usermod -aG video $USER

NordVPN

Thanks to the AUR package nordvpn-bin, I no longer have to manually maintain my VPN connections manually with OpenVPN. However, it requires a service that we should activate:

sudo systemctl enable --now nordvpnd

Symlink some system config files

We have some files in etc/ that are to be symlinked to /etc.

  for f in (find ~/.etc -type f)
      set dest (echo $f | sed -n 's/^.*etc\(.*\)$/\/etc\1/p')
      sudo ln -s $f $dest
  end

We may also want to symlink our nanorc to the /root directory for when we use nano as sudo.

  read --prompt "echo 'Symlink .nanorc to roots .nanorc? (Y/n): ' " -l nanoroot
  if test $nanoroot = 'y' || test $nanoroot = "Y" || test $nanoroot = ''
      printf "\n# Symlinking .nanorc to roots .nanorc ########################################\n\n"
      sudo ln -s $HOME/.nanorc /root/.nanorc
  end

Set up our fish shell

Install fisher

We will be using fisher as our extensions manager for Fish. Lets install it.

  printf "\n# Installing fisher ###########################################################\n\n"
  curl https://git.io/fisher --create-dirs -sLo ~/.config/fish/functions/fisher.fish

Install our extensions

I generally use the following extensions in my Fish shell.

  set FISHEXTENSIONS \
  edc/bass franciscolourenco/done jethrokuan/fzf jethrokuan/z \
  jorgebucaran/fish-getopts laughedelic/pisces matchai/spacefish \
  tuvistavie/fish-ssh-agent

Lets install these:

  fisher add $FISHEXTENSIONS

Install packages from git

Now, lets install some packages from git directly.

i3-gaps rounded

I know we already installed i3-gaps from the AUR, why reinstall it? Well, that is certainly bad practices, but this allowed me to already have the needed dependencies for building i3 installed. Now, lets clone it, build it, and install it. Doing this is probably very bad practices though, be warned.

  printf "\n# Install i3-gaps-rounded #####################################################\n\n"
  cd ~/fromGIT
  git clone https://github.com/resloved/i3.git i3-gaps-rounded
  cd i3-gaps-rounded
  rm -rf build
  autoreconf --force --install
  mkdir build && cd build
  ../configure --prefix=/usr --sysconfdir=/etc --disable-sanitizers
  make -j
  sudo make install

Polybar Battery

Now lets install polybar-battery. This is a binary that Ill use in my i3 config to indicate my battery level. It also sends a notification on low battery and on charging completed.

  printf "\n# Install polybar-battery #####################################################\n\n"
  cd ~/fromGIT
  git clone https://github.com/drdeimos/polybar_another_battery.git
  cd polybar_another_battery
  go get -u github.com/distatus/battery/cmd/battery
  make build

Now, we have our binary, lets symlink it in our local binary directory, ~/.local/bin.

  ln -s polybar-ab ~/.local/bin/polybar-ab

Reveal.JS

I sometimes use Reveal.JS to make presentations, and I set its location in my dotspacemacs file to be in ~/fromGIT, so lets clone it there.

  printf "\n# Install Reveal.JS ###########################################################\n\n"
  cd ~/fromGIT
  git clone https://github.com/hakimel/reveal.js.git

Install Rust

Install the toolchains

When using rust, I bounce between two toolchains, the stable toolchain and the nightly toolchain. To install them, I will use rustup which has already been installed.

  printf "\n# Install the rust toolchains, nightly is the default one #####################\n\n"
  rustup default nightly

This will both download the nightly toolchain and set it as the default one. Yup, I like to live dangerously. Now to install the stable toolchain, lets run this:

  rustup toolchain install stable

Install some utilities

Well need some utilities when developing Rust from Emacs, namely rustfmt and racer. Lets install them with cargo.

  printf "\n# Add rust utilities ##########################################################\n\n"
  cargo install rustfmt racer

We will also need some components for development purposes:

  rustup component add src
  rustup component add rls

Install some python packages

Some packages will be needed from pip in order to get our Emacs setup correctly working. Lets install them locally for our user:

  pip install --user pyls-isort pyls-mypy

Install go packages

For go development from Emacs, the Spacemacs go and lsp layers requires some packages to be installed.

  go get -v golang.org/x/tools/gopls@latest
  go get -u -v golang.org/x/tools/cmd/godoc
  go get -u -v golang.org/x/tools/cmd/goimports
  go get -u -v golang.org/x/tools/cmd/gorename
  go get -u -v golang.org/x/tools/cmd/guru
  go get -u -v github.com/cweill/gotests/...
  go get -u -v github.com/davidrjenni/reftools/cmd/fillstruct
  go get -u -v github.com/fatih/gomodifytags
  go get -u -v github.com/godoctor/godoctor
  go get -u -v github.com/golangci/golangci-lint/cmd/golangci-lint
  go get -u -v github.com/haya14busa/gopkgs/cmd/gopkgs
  go get -u -v github.com/josharian/impl
  go get -u -v github.com/mdempsky/gocode
  go get -u -v github.com/rogpeppe/godef
  go get -u -v github.com/zmb3/gogetdoc
  go get -u -v golang.org/x/tools/gopls

Set up Chicken (Scheme interpreter/compiler)

Chicken needs to be set up before being used. First, we need to install its documentation.

  chicken-install -s apropos chicken-doc

Then, well complete the documentation like so:

  cd (chicken-csi -b -e "(import (chicken platform))" -p "(chicken-home)")
  curl https://3e8.org/pub/chicken-doc/chicken-doc-repo.tgz | sudo tar zx

Clean the pacman and yay cache

Finally, we are almost done! Lets clean the cache of pacman and yay.

  printf "\n# Clean the pacman and yay cache ##############################################\n\n"
  yay -Sc --noconfirm

You should now run a system pretty close to the one I have on my main computer and my thinkpad.