I'm retiring these instructions, as a lot about my partitioning & environment has changed. I will make new ones from scratch.

Arch Linux Install Instructions

I made these instructions to help myself install Arch with a system-wide encrypted setup, EXT4, and XFCE4 as the DE. You should be able to easily adapt these to your use case, if you know what you're doing.

First, Boot from ArchISO disk

Initial partitioning:

cfdisk /dev/sda

Select DOS layout.
Make 1 bootable partition, starting at 2048, ending at +500M.
Make 1 non-bootable partition.

# make containers
mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda1
cryptsetup luksFormat /dev/sda2
cryptsetup luksOpen /dev/sda2 root
mkfs.ext4 /dev/mapper/root

# mount everything in preperation to build OS structure
mount /dev/mapper/root /mnt
mkdir /mnt/boot
mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/boot
vim /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

# Initialize Arch on target drive:

pacstrap /mnt base base-devel grub vim fish networkmanager git intel-ucode linux linux-firmware

# Initialize Arch filesystem table:

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

grub-install --recheck --boot-directory /mnt/boot /dev/sda

# Chroot into Arch install:

arch-chroot /mnt /bin/bash

# Fix locale stuff:

vim /etc/locale.gen


# In VIM, I then do:
1,$d
en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8
en_US ISO-8859-1
en_DK.UTF-8 UTF-8
en_DK ISO-8859-1
:wq


locale-gen
vim /etc/locale.conf
Set value to:
'''
LANG=en_US.UTF-8
LC_TIME=en_DK.UTF-8
'''
vim /etc/mkinitcpio.conf





# After `filesystems`, add `encrypt` and `shutdown`.

# Edit root passwd:

passwd

vim /etc/default/grub

# Remove QUIET
# Set GRUB_TIMEOUT to 1
GRUB_COLOR_NORMAL="light-magenta/black"
GRUB_COLOR_HIGHLIGHT="magenta/black"

#TODO: fic this part
# Change to something like this:
# `GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="cryptdevice=/dev/disk/by-uuid/[123-456-789]:root:allow-discards"`

# Or alternatively,
# `GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="cryptdevice=/dev/sda2:root:allow-discards"`

# Note allow-discards enables TRIM for SSDs. This is a non-trivial decision, so don't just blindly copy that part of it.

# cryptdevice=UUID=X syntax failed for some reason. Then it started being the only syntax that worked.

# Uncomment `GRUB_DISABLE_LINUX_UUID=true`. There's no need for UUIDs if we're mounting something under /dev/mapper with a statically set name. Plus, it'll make diagnostic messages easier to understand.

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

# Exit chroot and shutdown:

# Ctrl^D or `exit`

umount -R /mnt

cryptsetup luksClose root

shutdown now

After boot from Arch install

# Log in as root.

# Enable NetworkManager:
systemctl start NetworkManager
systemctl enable NetworkManager

# Set hostname:
hostnamectl set-hostname <hostname>

# Configure user settings:
useradd alex
mkdir /home/alex
chown alex.alex /home/alex
usermod -aG storage,power,wheel,uucp -s /usr/bin/fish alex
passwd alex

# Install core X11 stuff:
pacman -S xorg xorg-twm xorg-xclock xterm

# Install core audio stuff:
pacman -S alsa-utils pulseaudio

# Install desktop environment:
pacman -S xfce4 xfce4-goodies network-manager-applet
exit

Log off root. Log in as alex.

Bluetooth support

/etc/pulse/default.pa

load-module module-switch-on-connect

/etc/libao.conf

default_driver=pulse

crabdancing/arch_instructions_beta.md

Arch Linux Install Instructions

First, Boot from ArchISO disk

After boot from Arch install

Bluetooth support