Arch install from Commands to Graphical User Interface

This post is for experienced Linux users who are interesting to install Arch Linux. However, if you’re a Linux newbie, it’s quite possible to follow the tutorial. All you need to know is how to install Windows or Linux, and what/how to run a Terminal Emulator. The tutorial is from the perspective of a fan of Graphical User Interface (GUI), who is quite lazy for using commands and/or scripts.

Here is the video of this tutorial for your convenience to follow the text.

Before we start

What a long text?

Don’t worry, it just so happens the explanation is long, but action isn’t. When you get used to the process, the whole installation may take only about 30-45 minutes depending on the speed of your system & internet.

Arch Wiki

This tutorial is more or less like a “startup” for you to get to know more about Arch Linux. However, the more you know Arch the more you may better go with Arch Wiki, https://wiki.archlinux.org/. It’s a very helpful document.

{RECOMMENDATION} It’s better to practice installing Arch Linux on a virtual machine like VirtualBox or VMWare first. Later when you are familiar with the process you may install Arch onto your system.

archinstall

Arch installer comes with a script named “archinstall”. In brief, this script makes it easy & comfortable for newbies. However, “archinstall” has some limitations, e.g. you cannot manually partitioning your disk. On the other hand, manually installing Arch is the best way to learn more & deep about Linux.

Our goal

Certainly, Arch Linux installation is command-based, and it’s not newbie-friendly. But this doesn’t mean it’s difficult to install. So what will you get from this tutorial? In short, Arch install from Commands to Graphical User Interface. Therefore, here I’ll try my best to share with you step by step how to achieve this goal. To clarify, I have used the steps described here to install Arch Linux onto several x86-64 systems. Although it works for me, it might not work for you. Therefore, using it at your own risk as I cannot guarantee anything.

1. Preparation and boot the installer

Download Arch install ISO file

Arch Linux ISO file download: https://archlinux.org/download/

Create boot-USB

To create a bootable USB drive in Windows 7/8/10, I recommend Rufus https://rufus.ie/en_US/. Rufus is simple & easy, also it creates a USB drive that can be read/write from Windows and Linux (with MBR partition). For Windows and/or Linux users, another choice is Balena Etcher https://www.balena.io/etcher/. Etcher’s GPT partitioning creates a USB for live-distro only, which cannot open like an ordinary USB drive to read/write.

Set BIOS to boot USB

Boot sequence/order

Turn on your system, at the very first screen when power-up press F1 or F2 or F10 or any other key according to your system’s guide on how to log in to its BIOS settings. For which key to press and how to enter BIOS, you can read more here: https://www.wikihow.com/Enter-BIOS. In BIOS, at Boot Sequence/Order set 1st boot device to USB stick/disk.

Disable “Secure Boot”

{IMPORTANT} In BIOS, find the Security Boot option and disable it. Arch Linux does not support “Secure Boot”, which means it’ll not boot into Arch Installer if this is enabled.

Let’s install it! For this, we have to boot into the Arch Installer.

2. Keyboard Layout setting

So now we are at the command prompt of the Arch Installer. First things first, we have to set the keyboard layout.

{HINTS} You may skip this step if using a US Keyboard (qwerty). By default, the installation uses the “US” keyboard layout.

If you’re not using a “US” keyboard, then it’s time to look for your keyboard from the list by using the following command from the command prompt of the installer (and press Enter to go through the list):

ls /usr/share/kbd/keymaps/**/*.map.gz | more

To set the keyboard layout, select its FILENAME, omitting the file’s path and extension, and then append it to the “loadkeys” command below. For example, if your keyboard is (quertz) German then its name is “de-latin1”:

loadkeys de-latin1

3. Wi-Fi setup for Arch installation

For the ethernet, it’s mostly plug-and-play. So here we just see into setting up the wi-fi internet connection for Arch Installer. That is to say, we are using IWD as recommended by Arch Wiki installation instruction.

iwctl

After executing the above command, you’re put into the IWD command prompt. From there, type this to list your device:

device list

Select your wi-fi device. That is to say, in most cases, it’s “wlan0”. Further, we are looking for available networks:

station wlan0 get-networks

After that, assuming your wi-fi interface is “wlan0” and you want to connect to “mywifi” SSID, the command is as follow:

station wlan0 connect mywifi

Then enter the password for “mywifi” SSID. So now we are connected. Finally, it’s time to exit IWD and go back to the installer prompt.

exit

4. Arch Boot Mode verification

Most importantly, verifying boot mode is essential for the next steps. Type the following command:

ls /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

After that, if “cannot access” showed, you’re in BIOS mode. Otherwise, if a list is shown, you’re in UEFI mode. Remember this mode, you’ll need it.

5. Disk & Devices creating

{BE CAREFUL!} DO NOT ACCIDENTALLY ERASE/DELETE VITAL DISK(S)! Certainly, not just Arch, for every Linux/Windows installation, this is the most important session. Therefore, be careful when you’ve to pick/create some disks to use for installing the new system onto.

5.1. “fdisk -l” to list disk status

fdisk -l

Above command opens a kind of ‘disk and devices’ detail info. Firstly, pay attention to:

{Easy Chewing} a Disk is like a Cabinet, and Devices are like its Drawers. So, Cabinet has a fixed dimension (W x L x H), and theoretically, its Drawers can be repositioned or replaced, or even resized.

{BIOS BOOT MODE} disk label must be “DOS”. In short, the GRUB boot loader cannot work with a “GPT” label. Therefore, if the disk is “GPT”, you have to convert it to “MBR” (DOS) with the following command (for example disk /dev/sda):

sgdisk --gpttombr /dev/sda

{*} Certainly, there is a way to use a “GPT” disk in BIOS Boot Mode using Syslinux Boot Loader. However, for this tutorial, we are going with GRUB Boot Loader. For Syslinux, I may do another tutorial later.

{UEFI BOOT MODE} most recommendations are to label disk to “GPT” for this boot mode. If you want to convert an “MBR” (DOS) to “GPT”, use the following command (for example disk /dev/sda):

sgdisk --mbrtogpt /dev/sda

5.2. “cfdisk” to create disk partition and devices

So now that you know which “disk” to work with the Arch installation, we use the “cfdisk” command to make the next tasks easier (than with “fdisk”). For example, I choose disk “sda”:

cfdisk /dev/sda

Devices map suggestion

It’s not so different for creating a disk and its devices in BIOS or UEFI boot mode. I recommend creating a Disk with 3 Devices. For example Disk “sda” with the following Devices:

{SWAP or not} If your system RAM > 8Gb, SWAP may not be needed. You can go on without a SWAP device/file. However, having a SWAP on the system is still better (I think). Furthermore, some installation guides (Arch or other Linux distros) will set “SWAP File” instead of a “SWAP Device”. From my perspective, go with “SWAP File” in the end you still have to set it to a logical ‘fixed’ allocation. So, I’ll go with “SWAP Device” which is simple & sound.

Creating devices

Let’s create the disk and its devices. Use the “Up” and/or “Down” keyboard to select, and use the on-screen button [Delete] and/or [Resize] to make room for your new system disk. Following the delete/resize action, we’ll create our devices:

Complete devices creation

If you’re okay with each & every choice above, select [Write] then press Enter and type “yes”. When finished, [Quit].

5.3. Format devices

After quit “cfdisk”, we are back to the installer command prompt. Continuing the example “/dev/sda”, next we will format its newly created devices in accordance to the relating “boot mode”. You still remember your system boot mode, right?

BIOS boot mode (MBR)

For BIOS mode, execute the following commands one by one:

mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda1
mkswap /dev/sda2
mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda3

UEFI boot mode (GPT)

Carry out the following commands, one by one. Also notice the difference in the its first line comparing to BIOS mode.

mkfs.fat -F32 /dev/sda1
mkswap /dev/sda2
mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda3

{IMPORTANTLY!} In UEFI mode, “/dev/sda1” must be set to “bios_grub” for GRUB boot loader to work with it. In short, GRUB will fail and your system cannot boot into Arch Linux after installation, if not set to “bios_grub”. The following 2 commands will help you to check this status and set it accordingly if needed. (In “parted” command, device “/dev/sda1” is named as Number “1”).

parted /dev/sda print
parted /dev/sda set 1 bios_grub on

5.4. Devices mounting

Following above step, with example “/dev/sda”, we are now mounting its devices in accordance to the system boot mode. Devices mounting is needed to go on with the installation and also later for the system to work properly.

{IMPORTANT!} “root” – in this example it’s /dev/sda3 – must first mounted to “/mnt” (the name must be precisely “/mnt”). With “root” mounted, entrance for the others can then be created and mounted (e.g. /mnt/boot, or /mnt/efi).

BIOS boot mode (MBR)

Take the following commands one by one. Notice line 2 and line 3 are “/mnt/boot”.

mount /dev/sda3 /mnt
mkdir /mnt/boot
mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/boot
swapon /dev/sda2

UEFI boot mode (GPT)

For UEFI mode, we will do the following commands, one by one. Importantly, line 2 and line 3 are “/mnt/efi”. These are different from BIOS mode “/mnt/boot”.

mount /dev/sda3 /mnt
mkdir /mnt/efi
mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/efi
swapon /dev/sda2

6. Arch base installation

I recommend “Linux” kernel, but you can install “Linux-lts” instead; or even install both of them so you’ll have a reservation if one failed somehow. It’s up to you.

For both BIOS or UEFI boot mode, the “base” installation command is almost the same:

pacstrap /mnt base base-devel linux linux-headers linux-firmware libinput dkms nano grub

7. FSTAB generating

For options, choose “-U” if UUID or “-L” if Labels. Arch Wiki hints “-L” somehow make old computer runs faster.

genfstab -U /mnt >> /mnt/etc/fstab

{*} If later you want to modify/adjust fstab, type the below command to enter its text edit mode and delete its content. After this, rerun the above “genfstab” command with your decided value option:

nano /mnt/etc/fstab

8. CHANGE ROOT into the new system

For further installation steps, change to new system root:

arch-chroot /mnt

9. SYSTEM CLOCK update

We make sure that the clock is accurate:

timedatectl set-ntp true

10. TIME ZONE setup

Pick your Region

ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/

ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/Asia/

Pick your City (or a nearest one)

ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/Asia/Saigon

Full command of example /Asia/Saigon

ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/Asia/Saigon /etc/localtime

11. HARDWARE CLOCK setup

The following command will generate /etc/adjtime:

hwclock --systohc

12. LOCALIZATION

Edit Arch “locale.gen” file

nano /etc/locale.gen

Generate the locale(s)

locale-gen

Configuring locale(s)

nano /etc/locale.conf

13. KEYBOARD LAYOUT set persistent

{HINTS} You may skip this step if using a US Keyboard (qwerty). By default, Arch Linux uses the “US” keyboard layout.

In section “2. Keyboard Layout setting” we just set it for the installation process. In this section, we will set it to be persistent on the newly installed system. Use nano to create/edit “vconsole.conf” file:

nano /etc/vconsole.conf

14. NETWORK configuration

Create a Hostname (name of your computer)

nano /etc/hostname

Add/edit entries in Hosts

nano /etc/hosts

15. ROOT PASSWORD setup

The root’s password is important, so set it up:

passwd

16. BOOT LOADER installation

Remember your system boot mode, BIOS or UEFI? Now set GRUB boot loader accordingly (either BIOS or UEFI).
{*} Suppose that you installed grub (and efibootmgr for UEFI) in section “6. Base Installation” aforementioned.

for BIOS with MBR

Execute the following 2 commands, one by one:

grub-install /dev/sda
grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

for UEFI with GPT

Execute the following 2 commands, one by one:

grub-install /dev/sda --bootloader-id=GRUB --efi-directory=/efi
grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

Dual boot Windows and Arch

If you’re NOT USING DUAL BOOT, skip this step and go to the next section hereinafter. Otherwise, let’s get some tools:

pacman -S ntfs-3g os-prober

Now run os-prober so it will detect any Windows Boot Loader on the system:

os-prober

Edit GRUB default settings:

nano /etc/default/grub

Next, regenerate GRUB configurations to update GRUB entries so it will add Windows 7/8/10 bootloader:

grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

17. SUPER-USER setting

Best is to run the system with a super-user account (not root).

Set name for super-user

useradd -m yourname

Set password for new user

passwd yourname

Set role for new user

usermod -aG wheel,audio,video,optical,power,storage yourname

Give rights to wheel group

nano /etc/sudoers

18. DESKTOP ENVIRONMENT (DE) installing

Install the X Window System

pacman -S xorg xorg-xinit

If you install Arch Linux from within VirtualBox, add this:
virtualbox-guest-utils

Network and Printing

That’s just the infrastructure. We need more packages (a lot more). It’s now time for your decision making, Internet & Wi-Fi connection method.
+ Option 1: use NetworkManager with wpa_supplement, for this we have to use: iw networkmanager network-manager-applet
+ Option 2: use Networkd with iwd, but it’s wi-fi only (no ethernet), for this: iw iwd systemd-resolvconf

My recommendation is ‘Option 1’. If so, our next command will be:

pacman -S iw networkmanager network-manager-applet firefox cups cups-pdf

By the way, here we activate the printing service:

systemctl enable cups

Video Card Driver setup

Depending on your system, select one set that matches your video card.

* for most open-source video card drivers:

pacman -S xorg-drivers

* for propriety Nvidia Optimus (hybrid video card):

pacman -S nvidia nvidia-dkms nvidia-prime nvidia-settings nvidia-utils libinput libxnvctrl opencl-nvidia xf86-input-libinput xf86-input-vmmouse xf86-video-fbdev xf86-video-intel

pacman -Rns xf86-video-vesa

To check your Nvidia Optimus video card and see what drivers are using, execute this command:
lspci -k | grep -A 2 -i “VGA”

Desktop Environment or Windows Manager?

It depends. What’s your system? What’s your purpose to use Arch Linux? For most users, it’s Desktop Environment (DE) to go. However, even as you decided to go with DE, the 2 “what” questions still arise. So, decision is yours to make.

In this tutorial I show you how to install and configure 3 DE: Budgie, Gnome, and Mate. Also I’ll introduce you with most useful packages (apps) to use with these DE. For other Desktop Environment, please refer to Arch Wiki guide: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Desktop_environment

BUDGIE DE install

Budgie DE is modern with contemporary layout. However, it depends a bit on Gnome. I use Budgie DE on my daily drive, because I love its beauty & simplicity. To install Budgie DE, follow the below steps:

pacman -S budgie-desktop budgie-desktop-view budgie-extras budgie-screensaver lightdm lightdm-gtk-greeter lightdm-gtk-greeter-settings light-locker gnome-control-center gnome-terminal gnome-code-assistance gedit nautilus file-roller

Above command installs necessary packages for running Budgie DE. You may see there are “gnome” packages in this installation. Those are needed to operate & manage Budgie DE. Furthermore, we will do additional configuration:

nano ~/.xinitrc

Now we activate lightdm:

systemctl enable lightdm

GNOME DE install

As you can see in the aforementioned “Budgie DE” section, it depends on GNOME. In my opinion, and that’s how I do, install GNOME as the baseline for Budgie to function flawlessly. On the other hand, ‘base’ GNOME packages will take only around 1Gb – less than a USB drive these days – so I install both DE.

pacman -S gnome gnome-code-assistance gnome-nettool gnome-sound-recorder gnome-tweaks gnome-usage

And that we have GNOME installed, we will configure it to run if selected at the login screen.

nano ~/.xinitrc

MATE DE install

Mate DE is lightweight, simple, elegant in its field supporting not-so-strong computers. If you tweak it and rearrange its layout, Mate DE will look nice while being light & fast. So, my second choice for DE is Mate, if not using Budgie.

pacman -S mate mate-extra lightdm lightdm-gtk-greeter lightdm-gtk-greeter-settings light-locker variety

Next, it’s to configure entrance for Mate DE:

nano ~/.xinitrc

Now we activate lightdm:

systemctl enable lightdm

19. RESTART Arch Linux

Okay, we’ve accomplished the most important part of the installation. It’s now time to boot our newly installed Arch Linux. For this, first exit root working directory:

exit

Now that you’re back in “root@archiso” prompt, execute this command to reboot:

reboot

Remember to remove the installation USB-drive.
{*} Instead of “reboot”, you can turn off the system (to go for a coffee or so) with either “poweroff” command or “shutdown now” command.

POST-INSTALLATION

If you stop right now, you’ll have a system that runs properly with a Desktop Environment that lets you use Graphical User Interface (GUI) applications. However, it’s just the “basic” (infrastructure) so far, without office apps nor useful utilities. Therefore, we need to do just a little bit more here.

20. BIOS boot sequence/order

Reboot/turn-on your system, at the very first screen when power-up press F1 or F2 or F10 or any other key according to your system’s guide on how to log in to its BIOS settings. For which key to press and how to enter BIOS, you can read more here: https://www.wikihow.com/Enter-BIOS. In BIOS, at Boot Sequence/Order set 1st boot device to Arch Linux boot/efi partition.

21. System network configuration

In section “18. Desktop Environment (DE) installation” at part “Network and Printing” there were 2 options for you to select. And this tutorial went on with my recommendation “Option 1” using NetworkManager. So, here we proceed with that choice. Later in this section I also will show you how to configure network with “Option 2” using Networkd & IWD.

But first, we proceed with “NetworkManager” as it’s easy & simple.

Enable & start services

Assuming that you have installed networkmanager and network-manager-applet. As you’ve logged in using your super-user account (instead of root, which is not recommended), commands from this section on use “sudo”.

sudo systemctl enable NetworkManager
sudo systemctl start NetworkManager

Set up wi-fi connection

Click the “network” icon on taskbar to connect to your wifi connection, or go to Menu and open “Advanced Network Configuration” to add a wifi. However, if you want it the “command line” way, then type these in the Terminal:

sudo nmcli device wifi list
sudo nmcli device wifi connect SSID password PASSWORD

(optional) Set up Additional DNS servers

By default, system DNS setting is quite “amazingly slow” (true in my case, Vietnam). So for me, I often use DNS server from Cloudflare and/or Google to speed up my wi-fi connection. If you want to do so, please follow the steps hereinafter.

Go to Menu, open “Advanced Network Configuration”, select your wifi, and click on the “gear icon button” (Edit the selected connection).

Select tab “IPv4 Settings“, and set the following:
    + in “Method”, set it to “Automatic (DHCP) addresses only“; and
    + in “Additional DNS servers” set this: 1.1.1.1, 8.8.8.8

Select tab “IPv6 Settings“, and set the following:
    + in “Method”, set it to “Automatic, addresses only“; and
    + in “DNS servers” set this: 2606:4700:4700::1111, 2001:4860:4860::8888

22. SECURE BOOT setup

Read Arch Wiki for up-to-date instructions, search for “Unified Extensible Firmware Interface / Secure Boot”. For me, it’s simple, manually activate/deactivate “Secure Boot” in BIOS for booting into “secure” MS Windows 10/11 or “free” Arch Linux BTW. Do it that way because I don’t want to mess up things with manual keys.

23. USER’S DIRECTORIES

User’s directories are those commonly seen like Documents, Pictures, Musics… which locate in Home folder. For those, Arch Linux automatically installs & configure xdg-user-dirs, but if it’s not, run the following commands:

sudo pacman -S xdg-user-dirs
xdg-user-dirs-update

24. ADDITIONAL PACKAGES

As said in the “Post-installation” section, we have to install additional packages for Arch Linux to operate flawlessly with Graphical User Interface (GUI) apps. You may look into Arch “Packages” for more details, https://archlinux.org/packages/.

A long command

The following command will install quite a lot of packages. You can check what each one is in Arch “Packages” and decide which to keep which not. Also, you can just install all these packages, and later if you don’t need one just remove them with “sudo pacman -Rns” command. It’s up to you.

sudo pacman -S alsa-firmware alsa-plugins alsa-utils bind bleachbit clamav dconf dconf-editor ffmpeg ffmpegthumbnailer fwupd fwupd-efi gparted gvfs hplip hwdetect hwinfo inetutils intel-ucode jre-openjdk laptop-detect mkinitcpio mkinitcpio-busybox mkinitcpio-nfs-utils mkinitcpio-utils mousetweaks neofetch net-tools nfs-utils ntfs-3g openconnect openssh openvpn p7zip pacman-contrib pcmanfm plank rsync samba simple-scan tar tlp transmission-gtk tree ttf-liberation ttf-opensans noto-fonts noto-fonts-extra ufw ufw-extras gufw unrar usbutils util-linux webp-pixbuf-loader wireless-regdb wireless_tools zsh adapta-gtk-theme arc-gtk-theme arc-icon-theme elementary-icon-theme gtk-theme-elementary materia-gtk-theme papirus-icon-theme languagetool fcitx5 fcitx5-configtool fcitx5-gtk code python python-pip python-virtualenv libreoffice-fresh nano blender clementine gimp inkscape obs-studio shotcut vlc

Graphical User Interface (GUI) system

Our goal is to set up a system that mainly operates on Graphical User Interface (GUI). This means less using commands on Terminal Emulator. For this goal, there are still few more steps ahead.

25. YAY installation

Yay! That sounds pretty optimistic and fun, right? And YAY is very helpful to install AUR packages. First, we need some prerequisite tools:

sudo pacman -S --needed git base-devel

Clone the repository to your local storage. Do not use “sudo” here! If you do, your download will be owned by root, but you can not compile the package as root.

git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/yay-git.git

Change the permissions of the folder, and navigate to it:

chmod 777 yay-git
cd yay-git

Build the package. Also, do not run below command as “sudo” root user; otherwise, it will raise an error.

makepkg -si

Now that YAY is installed, we can use it to install AUR package with the command: “yay -S package-name” (similar to pacman -S package-name). However, there is another way with full GUI support from install to remove and update packages (both official and AUR). It’s “pamac”.

26. PAMAC – a graphical Package Manager

Install PAMAC with YAY

yay -S pamac-aur

After that, we have to replace a package in pamac-aur:

yay -S archlinux-appstream-data-pamac

Add/Remove Software

Next, open “Menu” and look for “Add/Remove Software“. The position of this in the “Menu” depends on your Desktop Environment. However, it’s not hard to find “Add/Remove Software”. Click to open it.
    {*} You can use Terminal command to open it also. Type this in Terminal: pamac-manager

In “Add/Remove Software”, click on the “3 dots” icon, select “Preferences”.

Next, select “Third Party” tab, and check/enable “Enable AUR support”.

Also check/enable “Check for updates”.

Okay, relax & enjoy Arch Linux! From this point forward almost everything can do from Graphical User Interface (GUI). Install/Remove/Update all can do via Add/Remove Software (pamac-manager).

Some interesting AUR package

prime-switcher

Remember “prime-switcher” I mentioned in section “18. Desktop Environment (DE) installing”? In that section, at the part “* for propriety Nvidia Optimus (hybrid video card)” I said there is 1 more package to install after YAY. So, now we do it either with Add/Remove Software (pamac-manager) or terminal command as below:

yay -S prime-switcher

Some other packages

Additionally, below are several other packages for Budgie/Gnome/Mate DE. Those you may consider installing onto your system. However, everything is up to you.

    + Icon & theme:  avatar-theme-neru, mate-neru-canta-theme, neru-icon-classic-theme
    + Budgie DE windows manager:  budgie-windowshuffler
    + Internet browser:  chrome, brave
    + Code OSS accessories:  code, code-features, code-marketplace, code-minimap
    + Terminal Emulator:  terminator, spacefm
    + System backup:  timeshift

xbindkeys

If some special keys on your keyboard not functioning as designed, for example: [Print Screen], [Volume +/-], install the following:  xbindkeys, xbindkeys_config-gtk2

{xbindkeys} uses for binding keyboard to specific command, for example: printscreen, scroll lock, pause/break; you can read more about it here: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Xbindkeys#Configuration

27. Enjoy Arch journey!

There are plenty more things to learn about Arch Linux. Certainly, this tutorial is just to help you with the few startup steps into the long & joyful journey named Arch Linux BTW. Enjoy!

What’s next? If you’re interesting in Cyber Security or Penetration Testing, please go for “BlackArch how to install – 2021” https://viws.net/blackarch-how-to-install-2021/. Video of this tutorial is here: https://youtu.be/PTrtfAo70Dg