Arch + i3-gaps Install Guide

First set up your keyboard layout. For example, in Spanish:

   # loadkeys es

For a list of all acceptable keymaps:

   # localectl list-keymaps

Pre-installation

EFI-enabled BIOS

This guide assumes you have EFI-enabled BIOS. Let's check it out.

   # ls /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

When you run this command you should see a list of files.

Internet connection

To make sure you have an internet connection, you have to ask Mr. Google:

   # ping 8.8.8.8

Add best Arch mirrors

To install arch you have to download packages. It's a good idea to download them from the best connection mirror.

   # pacman -Sy
   # pacman -S reflector
   # reflector --latest 5 --sort rate --save /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

Partition disk

Your primary disk will be known from now on as sda. You can check if this is really your primary disk:

   # lsblk

Feel free to adapt the rest of the guide to sdb or any other if you want to install Arch on a secondary hard drive.

This guide will use a 250GB hard disk and will have only Arch Linux installed. You'll create 5 partitions of the disk (feel free to suit this to your needs).

/dev/sda1 boot partition (1G).
/dev/sda2 swap partition (4G).
/dev/sda3 root partition (50G).
/dev/sda4 home partition (100G).
/dev/sda5 data partition (remaining disk space).

You're going to start by removing all the previous partitions and creating the new ones.

   # gdisk /dev/sda

This interactive CLI program allows you to enter commands for managing your HD. I'm going to show you only the commands you need to enter.

Clear partitions table

   Command: O
   Y

EFI partition (boot)

   Command: N
   ENTER
   ENTER
   +1G
   EF00

SWAP partition

   Command: N
   ENTER
   ENTER
   +4G
   8200

Root partition (/)

   Command: N
   ENTER
   ENTER
   +50G
   8304

Home partition

   Command: N
   ENTER
   ENTER
   +100G
   8302

Data partition

   Command: N
   ENTER
   ENTER
   ENTER
   ENTER

Save changes and exit

   Command: W
   Y

Format partitions

   # mkfs.fat -F32 /dev/sda1
   # mkswap /dev/sda2
   # mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda3
   # mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda4
   # mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda5

Mount partitions

   # swapon /dev/sda2
   # mount /dev/sda3 /mnt
   # mkdir /mnt/{boot,home}
   # mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/boot
   # mount /dev/sda4 /mnt/home

If you run the lsblk command you should see something like this:

   NAME   MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
   sda      8:0    0 232.9G  0 disk
   ├─sda1   8:1    0     1G  0 part /mnt/boot
   ├─sda2   8:2    0     4G  0 part [SWAP]
   ├─sda3   8:3    0    50G  0 part /mnt
   ├─sda4   8:4    0   100G  0 part /mnt/home
   └─sda5   8:5    0  77.9G  0 part

Installation

Update the system clock

   # timedatectl set-ntp true

Install Arch packages

   # pacstrap /mnt base base-devel openssh linux linux-firmware neovim

Generate fstab file

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

Add basic configuration

Enter the new system

   # arch-chroot /mnt

Language-related settings

   # nvim /etc/locale.gen

Now you have to uncomment the language of your choice, for example en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8.

   # locale-gen
   # nvim /etc/locale.conf

Add this content to the file:

   LANG=en_US.UTF-8
   LANGUAGE=en_US
   LC_ALL=C

   # nvim /etc/vconsole.conf

Add this content to the file:

   KEYMAP=us

Configure timezone

For this example I'll use "Europe/Madrid", but adapt it to your zone.

   # ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/Europe/Madrid /etc/localtime
   # hwclock —-systohc

Enable SSH, NetworkManager and DHCP

These services will be started automatically when the system boots up.

   # pacman -S dhcpcd networkmanager network-manager-applet
   # systemctl enable sshd
   # systemctl enable dhcpcd
   # systemctl enable NetworkManager

Install bootloader

   # pacman -S grub-efi-x86_64 efibootmgr
   # grub-install --target=x86_64-efi --efi-directory=/boot --bootloader-id=arch
   # grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

You can replace "arch" with the id of your choice.

Choose a name for your computer

Assuming your computer is known as "thinkpad":

   # echo thinkpad > /etc/hostname

Adding content to the hosts file

   # nvim /etc/hosts

And add this content to the file:

   127.0.0.1    localhost.localdomain   localhost
   ::1          localhost.localdomain   localhost
   127.0.0.1    thinkpad.localdomain    thinkpad

Replace "thinkpad" with your computer name.

Install other useful packages

   # pacman -S iw wpa_supplicant dialog intel-ucode git reflector lshw unzip htop
   # pacman -S wget pulseaudio alsa-utils alsa-plugins pavucontrol xdg-user-dirs

Update root password

   # passwd

Final steps

   # exit
   # umount -R /mnt
   # swapoff /dev/sda2
   # reboot

Post-install configuration

Now your computer has restarted and in the login window on the tty1 console you can log in with the root user and the password chosen in the previous step.

Add your user

Assuming your chosen user is "thinkpad":

   # useradd -m -g users -G wheel,storage,power,audio thinkpad
   # passwd thinkpad

Grant root access to our user

   # EDITOR=nvim visudo

If you prefer not to be prompted for a password every time you run a command with "sudo" privileges you need to uncomment this line:

   %wheel ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL

Or if you prefer the standard behavior of most Linux distros you need to uncomment this line:

   %wheel ALL=(ALL) ALL

Login into newly created user

   # su - thinkpad
   $ xdg-user-dirs-update

Install AUR package manager

In this guide we'll install yay as the AUR package manager. More about AUR.

TL;DR AUR is a Community-driven package repository.

   $ mkdir Sources
   $ cd Sources
   $ git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/yay.git
   $ cd yay
   $ makepkg -si

The coolest Pacman

If you want to make Pacman look cooler you can edit the configuration file and uncomment the Color option and add just below the ILoveCandy option.

   $ sudo nvim /etc/pacman.conf

PulseAudio applet

If you want to manage your computer's volume from a small icon in the systray:

   $ yay -S pa-applet-git

Manage Bluetooth

   $ sudo pacman -S bluez bluez-utils blueman
   $ sudo systemctl enable bluetooth

Improve laptop battery consumption

   $ sudo pacman -S tlp tlp-rdw powertop acpi
   $ sudo systemctl enable tlp
   $ sudo systemctl enable tlp-sleep
   $ sudo systemctl mask systemd-rfkill.service
   $ sudo systemctl mask systemd-rfkill.socket

If your laptop is a ThinkPad, also run this:

   $ sudo pacman -S acpi_call

Enable SSD TRIM

   $ sudo systemctl enable fstrim.timer

i3-gaps related steps

Install graphical environment and i3

   $ sudo pacman -S xorg-server xorg-apps xorg-xinit
   $ sudo pacman -S i3-gaps i3blocks i3lock numlockx

Install display manager

The display manager allows us to log in to the system graphically and also to automate the startup of some services. LightDM is one of the most lightweight display managers.

   $ sudo pacman -S lightdm lightdm-gtk-greeter --needed
   $ sudo systemctl enable lightdm

Install some basic fonts

   $ sudo pacman -S noto-fonts ttf-ubuntu-font-family ttf-dejavu ttf-freefont
   $ sudo pacman -S ttf-liberation ttf-droid ttf-roboto terminus-font

Install some useful tools on i3

   $ sudo pacman -S rxvt-unicode ranger rofi dmenu --needed

Install some GUI programs

   $ sudo pacman -S firefox vlc --needed

Apply previous settings

   $ sudo reboot

Rice i3-gaps

"Rice" is how we know to make visual improvements and customizations to the desktop and its programs.

Console

The program we use the most is the console emulator. I use kitty as a replacement for urxvt, the default terminal emulator on i3. However, these improvements can be applied to any terminal emulator.

zsh

zsh is an alternative to bash shell I particularly love. You can also have a look at the fish shell, because even though I haven't tried it, it looks very cool.

   $ sudo pacman -S zsh

Oh My Zsh

There is also a set of add-ons that we install on top of zsh that provide us a series of interesting goodies, as well as a new and improved prompt.

To install Oh My Zsh we need to run the following command:

   $ sh -c "$(wget https://raw.github.com/ohmyzsh/ohmyzsh/master/tools/install.sh -O -)"

During the execution of the command you will be asked if you want to set zsh as the default shell for your user. You have to confirm this.

LXAppearance

With LXAppearance you can change themes, icons, cursors or fonts.

   $ sudo pacman -S lxappearance

Once you have installed LXAppearance, you can start exploring the many possible customization options by installing the great Arc theme and the Papirus icons theme.

   $ sudo pacman -S arc-gtk-theme
   $ sudo pacman -S papirus-icon-theme

Customize LightDM

At this point you can also customize the look of LigthDM. You can blow your mind by adding Papirus icons and Arc theme in LightDM, just by editing its config file.

   $ sudo nvim /etc/lightdm/lightdm-gtk-greeter.conf

In this file you have to add these lines

   [greeter]
   theme-name = Arc-Dark
   icon-theme-name = Papirus-Dark
   background = #2f343f

You can also custom the font with the same one you added in LXAppearance, just by adding font-name = Whatever to this file.

fjpalacios/arch-i3gaps-install.md