Quick Arch Deploy

The script should perform most of the heavy lifting (or repeatable tasks) however there are tasks to be performed once to prepare the system. This guide is prepared using Arch Installation Guide on Arch Wiki. This is quick one pager for reference only. For more details, refer Arch Wiki.

Support

I'm still learning and may not always be able to help. In case you know or fix any problem, please feel free to fork and suggest changes as required. I'll be obliged to improve this script as we move along.

Table of Contents

S.No.	File Name	Description
01	Preparation	Quick guide to activities to be performed before running the scripts
02	Partition	Preaparing the disk paritions
03	Installation	Install Arch Linux before running the scripts

Preparation

Load the correct keyboard map

Run the below command to get the keymap names available

ls /usr/share/kbd/keymaps/**/*xx*.map.gz

xx is country code e.g us for USA, uk for UK, de for Germany

Run below command to set the correct keys. Don't need for US keyboard

loadkeys us
loadkeys uk
loadkeys de-latin1

de-latin1 is for Germany

Connect to the internet

Check if your network interface is listed and enabled for internet

ip link

Verify network is working by ping-ing your favourite website

ping archlinux.org

If there is no network, check hardware connections and Wifi is not hard disabled (some devices have switch or external wifi dongle is removed). Check if network interface is not soft blocked using rkfill command

rfkill list

If network interface is blocked then unblock network adapter

rkfill unblock wifi

Setup Wifi

Run command to launch interactive shell

iwctl

The command prompt should change to [iwd]#. Help is avaialble by typing help command. When done, press ctrl+d to quit. Auto-completion is enabled, therefore hit Tab key to auto-complete suggestion

Connect to network

Get list of your devices. We need this to command the correct device to perform the following activities

device list

Scan for networks

station <device> scan

The scanning might take sometime, depending on your network strength

station <device> get-networks

Now connect to the network. Enter the password on prompt

station <device> connect <SSID>

Get Connection information

Get details of wifi device

device <device> list

Check the connection state

station <device> list

Get list of known networks connected

known-networks list

Disconnect from network

If network is not stable or like to connect to other network

station <device> disconnect

Forget the known network

known-networks <SSID> forget

Set System Time

Ensure System clock is accurate

timedatectl set-ntp true

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Partition

Partition Hard Disk

Partition using fdisk, gdisk or any of your application of your choice. For EUFI, drive should have a GPT partition table. /root & /boot partitions are mandatory.

Suggested partition layout:

Partition	Size (Without Hibernation)	Size (With Hibernation)
Boot	512 MB	NA
Swap (RAM < 2 GB)	Same as RAM	RAM * 2
Swap (RAM >= 2 GB & < 4 GB)	Half of RAM	RAM + 2
Swap (RAM >= 4 GB & < 8 GB)	Half of RAM	Depending on load (> RAM)
Swap (RAM >= 8 GB)	Depending on load	Depending on load (> RAM)
Root (With home partition)	25 GB	NA
Root (No home partition)	50 GB	NA

Mount partitions

Mount the root partition

mkfs.ext4 /dev/<root_partition> -L <label>
mount /dev/<root_partition> /mnt

Mount the EFI partition

mkfs.fat -F32 /dev/<efi_partition>
mkdir /mnt/boot
mount /dev/<efi_partition> /mnt/boot

If you've separate home partition, mount the home partition. The home directory would be automatically created in /mnt if a partition is not assigned

mkfs.ext4 /dev/<home_partition> -L <label>
mkdir /mnt/home
mount /dev/<home_partition> /mnt/home

Mount swap partition if created separately. The script will prompt to create a swapfile during install. Warning: Do not perform mkswap if you've existing swap partition being used.

mkswap /dev/<swap_partition>
swapon /dev/<swap_partition>

Verify the mounted partitions

Use findmnt to identify the mounted paritions.

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Installation

Install Arch Linux

Get latest mirrors and install the base package only The command reflector --list-countries would get the county code which will be used as parameter to -c option for reflector. I've set it as GB for my purpose.

pacman -Syy reflector
reflector --list-countries | grep "GB"
cp /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist.bak
reflector -c "GB" --age 12 --fastest 20 --latest 20 -n 20 --protocol https --sort rate --save /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist
pacstrap /mnt base git nano

• You may use vim or nano or both as an editor

Prepare the filesystem

Run the comamnd to tell the installation where to look for the OS

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

Let the script do the work

Go into the Arch installation and get the files from git but before that few more steps.

arch-chroot /mnt
git clone https://github.com/samdlaw/quick-arch-deploy.git
cd quick-arch-deploy
chmod +x deploy-arch-uefi.sh
chmod +x install-desktop.sh
./deploy-arch-uefi.sh

If you want to install Desktop Environment, run the install-desktop script. If system was rebooted, use sudo to run the script.

cd /quick-arch-deploy
./install-desktop.sh

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