I use i3blocks for the status bar and dmenu as application launcher. i3-gaps as my window manager - I don’t need any heavyweight desktop environment such as KDE or Gnome.It also takes care of installing the packages I want from the start on an Arch system. I implemented a very personal bash-based “framework” to manage my dotfiles (and more, config files, bashrc, aliases, etc.) so at this point making a system feel at home only requires cloning that repo and hooking it up so it runs on login.
#Arch linux macbook password#
I have very little use for other GUI-based applications, except Keepassxc (and that’s because I used a poor naming scheme when I created my password database otherwise I’d use its command-line interface). I’m not a gamer, when I use a computer I’d say I’m at least 90% of the time either at the terminal or in a web browser. At this point, booting the macbook with the USB drive plugged in and the option key pressed shows the bootloader menu with the option to select the EFI Arch Linux bootloader. This results in a working console-based system, and although there’s much configuration to be done next, the rest is much more subjective.
#Arch linux macbook install#
next came network configuration, which was a bit of a pain because lspci is not accurate in the VM, so there were some back and forth between the real OS and the VM to get internet access to install the driver my macbook pro has a Broadcom 43602 card and the b43-firmware (AUR) package works for me.create my user, set a password and add myself to the sudoers (I added my user to the wheel group and uncommented %wheel ALL=(ALL) ALL in visudo).because the Mac’s resolution is so high, the console font is way too small for me by default, so I played around with setfont until I found something I liked, and persisted the setting in /etc/nf (I set it to FONT=ter-v28n, but keep in mind that I’m in my forties…).configure the pacman mirrorlist ( /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist) and install some basic packages to get started: pacman -S vim base-devel terminus-font dialog wpa_supplicant git openssh.I also use systemd instead of udev, so my HOOKS look like this: (base systemd block autodetect modconf filesystems keyboard fsck) when configuring nf, I had to make sure the block hook was before autodetect as explained on, otherwise I had the error mentioned in the question.configure the Arch Linux entry in the bootloader.setup boot to use systemd-boot (I installed Arch from a Virtual Box VM on macOS, and at this point I had to ensure the VM started in EFI mode, which hangs for minutes at startup, but ends up working - the Mac-specific instructions were documented in this wiki page).Mac-specific steps I had to make were (keep in mind that other approaches may work too, but this worked for me and my specific configuration): The Installationīasic setup is pretty straightforward and closely follows the installation wiki page. I had a 120GB Lacie USB drive around, so I figured I might as well install Arch on it and not touch my internal disk at all. But I still didn’t want to take away what little disk space I had for my work (128GB SSD) to dual-boot, and I wasn’t interested in running in a VM. So when the old Zenbook’s screen died I started considering buying another laptop, but what I really wanted was that great macbook hardware paired with my personal favorite OS.
#Arch linux macbook portable#
I work remotely, so the form factor makes it a great portable machine to go work in libraries, coffee shops or in a park during summer, and the battery life is good enough to be away from an outlet for an extended period of time (although not quite an entire work day). I also think it is the best laptop - the best computer - I’ve ever had, for my needs. I work as a freelance Go developer, and the overwhelming development platform of choice for the clients I work with - mostly startups - is macOS, so to make it easier for me to integrate to development teams (tools, setup, sharing installation information, etc.), my work machine is a mid-2015 13” Macbook Pro. I quickly started appreciating Arch Linux’ minimalist approach where you can relatively easily configure your distro to your liking, backed by an amazing wiki, rolling updates and an extensive, user-friendly package manager. At the time, I purchased a used 13” Asus Zenbook on ebay specifically to toy with different distros without risk for my work laptop. Since then, I tried a variety of distros and Unixes, such as Fedora and FreeBSD, but it wasn’t until early 2015 that I first installed Arch Linux. I started using Linux more seriously around 2010, with Ubuntu 10.10 (Maverick Meerkat), if memory serves me well, although I did play around with Corel’s Linux way back when.