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INSTALL.md

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Base system installation

1. Pre-installation

1.1 Connect to the internet

To set up a network connection in the live environment, go through the following steps:

ip link

  • For wireless and WWAN, make sure the card is not blocked with rfkill.

  • Connect to the network:

    • Ethernet—plug in the cable.
    • Wi-Fi—authenticate to the wireless network using iwctl.
    • Mobile broadband modem—connect to the mobile network with the mmcli utility.

  • The connection may be verified with ping:

For example, assuming your wireless device named wlan0:

iwctl station wlan0 connect <SSID>

Test your connection:

ping -с 3 archlinux.org

Note
In the installation image, systemd-networkd, systemd-resolved, iwd and ModemManager are preconfigured and enabled by default. That will not be the case for the installed system.

1.2 Update the system clock

In the live environment systemd-timesyncd is enabled by default and time will be synced automatically once a connection to the internet is established.

Use timedatectl(1) to ensure the system clock is synchronized:

timedatectl set-ntp true
timedatectl status

1.3 Partition the disk

When recognized by the live system, disks are assigned to a block device such as /dev/sda, /dev/nvme0n1 or /dev/mmcblk0. To identify these devices, use lsblk.

lsblk -o +PARTLABEL

Results ending in rom, loop or airoot may be ignored.

The following partitions are required for a chosen device:

Warning
If you want to create any stacked block devices do it now.

Given:

  • ~1000G - NVME SSD on /dev/nvme0n1 device
  • 16G - RAM

Use sgdisk to modify partition tables.

export DRIVE=/dev/nvme0n1

Disk partition example:

Mount point     Partition number        Partition type          Suggested size

/mnt/boot       /dev/nvme0n1p1          EFI system partition    1G, or at least 550 MiB
[SWAP]          /dev/nvme0n1p2          Linux swap 	            32G, about 2*RAM size
/mnt            /dev/nvme0n1p3          Linux root (x86-64)     128G, or at least 23–32 GiB
/mnt/home       /dev/nvme0n1p4          Linux home              Remainder of the device

See also Partitioning#Example layouts.

Tip
On UEFI-booted systems, if specific conditions are met, systemd-gpt-auto-generator(8) will automount GPT partitions following the Discoverable Partitions Specification.

Zap the disk:

sgdisk --zap-all $DRIVE

Warning
Zap (destroy) the GPT and MBR data structures and then exit. This option works much like -z, but as it wipes the MBR as well as the GPT, it's more suitable if you want to repartition a disk after using this option, and completely unsuitable if you've already repartitioned the disk.

Create the partitions:

sgdisk --new=1:0:+1GiB   --typecode=1:ef00 --change-name=1:EFI $DRIVE
sgdisk --new=2:0:+32GiB  --typecode=2:8200 --change-name=2:swap $DRIVE
sgdisk --new=3:0:+128GiB --typecode=3:8304 --change-name=3:system $DRIVE
sgdisk --new=4:0:0       --typecode=4:8302 --change-name=4:home $DRIVE

Tip
Use sgdisk -L | less to list all available partition type codes.

Check the partitions:

lsblk -o +PARTLABEL

Once the partitions have been created, each newly created partition must be formatted with an appropriate file system. See File systems#Create a file system for details.

[Format](https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/ EFI_system_partition#Format_the_partition) EFI system partition:

mkfs.fat -F32 -n EFI /dev/disk/by-partlabel/EFI

Warning
Only format the EFI system partition if you created it during the partitioning step. If there already was an EFI system partition on disk beforehand, reformatting it can destroy the boot loaders of other installed operating systems.

Format and mount root partition:

mkfs.ext4 -L system /dev/disk/by-partlabel/system

Format home partition:

mkfs.ext4 -L home /dev/disk/by-partlabel/home

Format and enable swap partition:

mkswap -L swap /dev/disk/by-partlabel/swap
swapon -L swap

Mount system partitions to /mnt:

mount -o noatime LABEL=system /mnt
mount -o noatime --mkdir LABEL=EFI /mnt/boot
mount -o noatime --mkdir LABEL=home /mnt/home

2. Installation

Use the pacstrap(8) script to install the base package, Linux kernel and firmware for common hardware:

pacstrap -K /mnt base linux-lts linux-firmware

Tip

  • You can substitute linux for a kernel package of your choice, or you could omit it entirely when installing in a container.
  • You could omit the installation of the firmware package when installing in a virtual machine or container.

The base package does not include all tools from the live installation, so installing other packages may be necessary for a fully functional base system.

In particular, consider installing:

To install other packages or package groups, append the names to the pacstrap command above (space separated) or use pacman while chrooted into the new system.

For comparison, packages available in the live system can be found in pkglist.x86_64.txt.

Generate an fstab file (use -U or -L to define by UUID or labels, respectively):

genfstab -L /mnt >> /mnt/etc/fstab

Check the resulting /mnt/etc/fstab file, and edit it in case of errors. Also, you can add corresponding mount options to extend your ssd lifespan.

3. Configure the system

Change root into the new system:

arch-chroot /mnt

3.1 Time

Set the time zone, for example Asia/Yekaterinburg:

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

Run hwclock(8) to generate /etc/adjtime:

hwclock --systohc

This command assumes the hardware clock is set to UTC. See System time#Time standard for details.

3.2 Localization

Edit /etc/locale.gen and uncomment or add your preffered locales and en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8 which is commonly used as a fallback locale.

echo "en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8" >> /etc/locale.gen
echo "ru_RU.UTF-8 UTF-8" >> /etc/locale.gen

Generate the locales by running:

locale-gen

Create the locale.conf(5) file, and set the LANG variable accordingly.

Create /etc/locale.conf with the follwing content:

echo "LANG=ru_RU.UTF-8" > /etc/locale.conf

3.2.1 Set the virtual console keyboard layout

If you set the console keyboard layout, make the changes persistent in vconsole.conf(5).

Available layouts can be listed with:

localectl list-keymaps

For example, create /etc/vconsole.conf with following content, to set a russian keyboard layout:

echo "KEYMAP=ru" >> /etc/vconsole.conf

3.2.2 Set the virtual console font

Console fonts are located in /usr/share/kbd/consolefonts/ and can likewise be set with setfont(8).

ls -l /usr/share/kbd/consolefonts/ | grep -i '.psfu.gz'

Add FONT variable to /etc/vconsole.conf according to your display density. For HiDPI displays:

echo "FONT=latarcyrheb-sun32" >> /etc/vconsole.conf

For low DPI displays:

echo "FONT=latarcyrheb-sun16" >> /etc/vconsole.conf

3.3 Network configuration

Create the hostname file:

echo "my-hostname" > /etc/hostname

Complete the network configuration for the newly installed environment. That may include installing suitable network management software.

3.4 Root password

Set the root password:

passwd

3.5 Initramfs

Creating a new initramfs is usually not required, because mkinitcpio was run on installation of the kernel package with pacstrap.

For system encryption modify mkinitcpio.conf(5) and recreate the initramfs image:

mkinitcpio -P

3.6 CPU Microcode

Select the CPU architecture:

export CPU_ARCH=amd # amd or intel

Enable microcode updates.

pacman -S $CPU_ARCH-ucode

3.7 Install essential packages

Basic set of essential packages:

pacman -Sy \
    base-devel \
    man-db man-pages \
    nano nano-syntax-highlighting \
    networkmanager iw wireless-regdb \
    bluez bluez-utils

3.8 systemd-boot

To verify the boot mode, list the efivars directory:

ls /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

If the command shows the directory without error, then the system is booted in UEFI mode.

Choose and install a Linux-capable boot loader. For example systemd-boot.

Use bootctl(1) to install systemd-boot to the ESP mountpoint, e.g. /boot:

bootctl install

This will copy the systemd-boot EFI boot manager to the ESP: on an x64 architecture system /usr/lib/systemd/boot/efi/systemd-bootx64.efi will be copied to /boot/EFI/systemd/systemd-bootx64.efi and /boot/EFI/BOOT/BOOTX64.EFI, and systemd-boot will be set as the default EFI application.

Note

  • When running bootctl install, systemd-boot will try to locate the ESP at /efi, /boot, and /boot/efi. (See bootctl(1) § OPTIONS for details.)
  • Installing systemd-boot will overwrite any existing esp/EFI/BOOT/BOOTX64.EFI, e.g. Microsoft's version of the file.

The loader configuration is stored in the file /boot/loader/loader.conf. See loader.conf(5) § OPTIONS for details.

Note
If options is present in a boot entry and Secure Boot is disabled, the value of options will override any .cmdline string embedded in the EFI image that is specified by efi or linux (see Unified kernel image#Preparing a unified kernel image). With Secure Boot, however, options (and any edits made to the kernel command line in the bootloader UI) will be ignored, and only the embedded .cmdline will be used.

Use the initrd option to load the microcode, before the initial ramdisk. If not compiled into the kernel, microcode must be loaded by the early loader. It can be passed to the loader as part of a unified kernel image, or as an initrd image.

The latest microcode *-ucode.img must be available at boot time in your ESP. The ESP must be mounted as /boot in order to have the microcode updated every time microcode is updated.

An example of loader files launching Arch from a volume labeled ARCH_OS and loading AMD CPU microcode is provided below.

Contents of /boot/loader/loader.conf:

default arch.conf
timeout 3
editor no
#console-mode keep

Contents of /boot/loader/entries/arch.conf:

title   Arch Linux
linux   /vmlinuz-linux-lts
initrd  /amd-ucode.img
initrd  /initramfs-linux-lts.img
options root="LABEL=ARCH_OS" rw nmi_watchdog=0

Contents of /boot/loader/entries/arch-fallback.conf:

title   Arch Linux Fallback
linux   /vmlinuz-linux-lts
initrd  /amd-ucode.img
initrd  /initramfs-linux-lts-fallback.img
options root="LABEL=ARCH_OS" rw nmi_watchdog=0

Tip

  • The available boot entries which have been configured can be listed with the command bootctl list.
  • An example entry file is located at /usr/share/systemd/bootctl/arch.conf.
  • The kernel parameters for scenarios such as LUKS or dm-crypt can be found on the relevant pages.

4. Reboot

Optionally manually unmount all the partitions with

umount -R /mnt

this allows noticing any "busy" partitions, and finding the cause with fuser(1).

Exit the chroot environment by pressing Ctrl+d or typing

exit

Finally, restart the machine by typing

reboot

any partitions still mounted will be automatically unmounted by systemd. Remember to remove the installation medium and then login into the new system with the root account.

5. Post-installation

See General recommendations for system management directions and post-installation tutorials (like creating unprivileged user accounts, setting up a graphical user interface, sound or a touchpad).

For a list of applications that may be of interest, see List of applications.

5.1 Network connection

Enable NetworkManager:

systemctl enable --now NetworkManager.service
systemctl enable --now systemd-resolved.service

Connect to the network using nmtui

nmtui

Enable Bluetooth:

systemctl enable --now bluetooth.service

5.2 User

A new installation leaves you with only the superuser account, better known as "root". Logging in as root for prolonged periods of time, possibly even exposing it via SSH on a server, is insecure. Instead, you should create and use unprivileged user account(s) for most tasks, only using the root account for system administration. See Users and groups#User management for details.

Users and groups are a mechanism for access control; administrators may fine-tune group membership and ownership to grant or deny users and services access to system resources. Read the Users and groups article for details and potential security risks.

NEWUSER=<USERNAME>

To add a new user, use the useradd command:

useradd -m -G sys,rfkill,wheel -s /bin/bash $NEWUSER

Set password for this user with passwd command:

passwd $NEWUSER

5.3 Security

Read Security for recommendations and best practices on hardening the system.

For a list of applications to allow running commands or starting an interactive shell as another user (e.g. root), see List of applications/Security#Privilege elevation.

Install the sudo package.

pacman -S sudo

To allow members of group wheel sudo access, create /etc/sudoers.d/wheel:

echo "%wheel ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL" > /etc/sudoers.d/wheel

Tip
When creating new administrators, it is often desirable to enable sudo access for the wheel group and add the user to it, since by default Polkit treats the members of the wheel group as administrators. If the user is not a member of wheel, software using Polkit may ask to authenticate using the root password instead of the user password.

5.4 SSD

systemctl enable --now fstrim.timer

Also you can install smartctl tool

pacman -Sy smartmontools

5.5 CPU controls

Install power-profiles-daemon:

pacman -Sy power-profiles-daemon

5.6 Sound

Install PipeWire and WirePlumber:

Tip
Packages pipewire-alsa, pipewire-pulse and pipewire-jack ships configuration that prompt media-session to activate PipeWire's audio features.

pacman -Sy \
    sof-firmware \
    alsa-firmware \
    pipewire \
    wireplumber \
    pipewire-alsa \
    pipewire-pulse \
    pipewire-jack \
    alsa-utils

5.7 Gnome shell

pacman -Sy \
    gnome \
    gst-plugin-pipewire \
    xdg-desktop-portal-gnome \
    dconf-editor \
    gnome-shell-extensions \
    gnome-shell-extension-appindicator \
    gnome-software-packagekit-plugin

Enable GDM

systemctl enable gdm.service

Restart the machine by typing reboot.

6. System maintenance

See MAINTENANCE.md

7. Devices

See DEVICES.md