Arch followup actions
Updates:
- 2022-06-23 | add networking, update packages, add GDM
Overview
Once you’ve installed Arch Linux, a couple of things are … nice. But very basic. Let’s get out of basic ;) .
Set up networking
Just do the same as described in the installation post.
Then, we set up IWD as backend for NetworkManger (NOTE: experimental!).
### FILE: /etc/NetworkManager/conf.d/wifi_backend.conf ###
[device]
wifi.backend=iwd
Create user
If you didn’t do it yet, create your user.
useradd -m -G wheel USERNAME
passwd USERNAME
You should have sudo installed, so do this:
# if you are really lazy and insecure
echo "%wheel ALL=(ALL:ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL" >> /etc/sudoers.d/wheel
# use this.
echo "%wheel ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL" >> /etc/sudoers.d/wheel
Now log in as this user and check if you can become root by typing sudo -i.
CLI packages
Some CLI “apps”:
pacman -S ack dnsmasq git ripgrep vim zsh git base-devel man-db man-pages
Install yay (AUR helper)
Remember: Do this as your “normal” user!
mkdir /tmp/yay
cd /tmp/yay
# from here stolen from yay's github page:
# https://github.com/Jguer/yay#source
git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/yay-bin.git
cd yay-bin
makepkg -si
Install UI
And here it goes for UI and UI-related things:
pacman -S gnome gnome-extra gnome-control-center \
cups network-manager-applet \
firefox
Now some AUR packages:
yay -S vscodium-bin
Configurations
For network manager, I prefer dnsmasq as the tool of choice, especially when using VPN connections:
### FILE: /etc/NetworkManager/conf.d/dns.conf ###
[Main]
dns=dnsmasq
Enable services
# enable
systemctl enable iwd
systemctl enable NetworkManager
systemctl enable org.cups.cupsd
# start
systemctl start iwd
systemctl start NetworkManager
systemctl start org.cups.cupsd
# to boot into GNOME
systemctl enable gdm
Some troubleshooting tricks
Gnome-terminal does not start
Set the locale, using “gnome control center”, and then re-login. (Source)