Chat Sheet for ArchlinuxARM installation on Raspberry Pi 3

archlinuxarm-rpi3-cheatsheet.md

ArchlinuxARM Cheat Sheet

Default credentials:

• alarm / alarm
• root / root

Basic setup with btrfs

The following setup requires qemu-arm-static and arch-chroot to be installed on the system where the SD card is prepared. So, start with installing these tools:

yay -S qemu-user-static-bin arch-install-scripts

All the following commands require root permissions, so it might be a good idea to start with sudo -s.

1. Find your sdcard with lsblk and start fdisk to partition the SD card:

    fdisk /dev/sdX
   

2. At the fdisk prompt, delete old partitions and create a new one:

   • Type o. This will clear out any partitions on the drive.
   • Type p to list partitions. There should be no partitions left.
   • Type n, then p for primary, 1 for the first partition on the drive, press ENTER to accept the default first sector, then type +100M for the last sector.
   • Type t, then c to set the first partition to type W95 FAT32 (LBA).
   • Type n, then p for primary, 2 for the second partition on the drive, and then press ENTER twice to accept the default first and last sector.
   • Write the partition table and exit by typing w.

3. Create and mount the boot partition:

    mkfs.vfat /dev/sdX1
    mkdir boot
    mount /dev/sdX1 boot
   

4. Create and mount the root partition:

    mkfs.btrfs /dev/sdX2
    mkdir root
    mount /dev/sdX2 root
    btrfs subvolume create root/root
   

5. Download and extract the root filesystem:

    wget http://os.archlinuxarm.org/os/ArchLinuxARM-rpi-3-latest.tar.gz
    bsdtar -xpf ArchLinuxARM-rpi-3-latest.tar.gz -C root/root
    sync
   

(ignore the "Failed to set file flags" messages)

6. Move boot files to the first partition:

    mv root/root/boot/* boot/
    sync
    umount boot root
   

7. chroot to the SD card and update the system:

    mount -o subvol=root,autodefrag,ssd /dev/sdX2 root
    mount /dev/sdX1 root/boot
    cp /usr/bin/qemu-arm-static root/usr/bin
    arch-chroot root /bin/bash
   

   Continue with the steps below and exit chroot afterwards using:

    exit
    umount root/boot root
   

8. Initialize and update the system:

    pacman-key --init
    pacman-key --populate archlinuxarm
    pacman -Syu
   

9. Install btrfs driver and register the btrfs partition as root:

    pacman -S btrfs-progs uboot-tools
   

   Add the following options to the bootargs line in /boot/boot.txt:

    rootflags=subvol=root,autodefrag,ssd
   

   Recompile the boot configuration:

    cd /boot
    ./mkscr
   

10. I usually use ansible to install all the rest. This requires python 2:

    pacman -S python2
    

Reduce requirements for video output

echo "gpu_mem=16" >> /boot/config.txt
echo "hdmi_safe=1" >> /boot/config.txt

Disable wifi

echo "dtoverlay=pi3-disable-wifi" >> /boot/config.txt

Configure a fixed IP

Write the following lines to /etc/systemd/network/20-wired.network

[Match]
Name=enp1s0

[Network]
Address=10.1.10.9/24
Gateway=10.1.10.1
DNS=10.1.10.1
#DNS=8.8.8.8