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Julien Chappuis edited this page May 21, 2023 · 3 revisions

Arch linux installation

This document contains my detailed install procedure for Arch Linux, covering my 2 use cases :

  • Dual boot EFI Arch Linux / Windows 11 on the same SSD on my laptop, with systemd-bootctl as the OS switcher

  • Dual install EFI Arch Linux / Windows 11 on 2 different SSD on my workstation, with the motherboard EFI bios as the OS swticher (no dual boot)

As 90% of the steps are the same, assume a step is common to both types of install unless flagged otherwise using Laptop or Workstation.

Important
 Windows is assumed to have been installed first (Windows installer can do messy things if it detects a Linux boot partition, such as overwriting the boot loader). This procedure will cover how to configure Windows to ensure peaceful cohabitation with Arch linux.

Overview

  • Base install of Arch Linux

    • disk partitionning

    • Bootloader : systemd-bootctl

    • Network config through NetworkManager, using Intel ethernet cards + Google DNS

  • Desktop environment :

    • Xorg

    • Qtile (Gnome is also documented)

  • Advanced console environment :

    • Terminal emulator : Kitty

    • Shell : Fish + customisations (Fisher, Starship, fzf.fish, etc…​) + Nerd fonts with ligatures

  • Dev environment

    • Java, Python, rust

    • VS code as the default code editor

    • Git + SSH + GnuPG, with gpg-agent acting as the ssh-agent, enabling signed commit for Github / Gitlab using Yubikeys as Smartcards

Laptop specific

  • Intel CPU configuration

  • usage of Intel wifi card with NetworkManager

Workstation overview

  • AMD CPU configuration

  • GPU : nvidia card using nvidia standard driver, using legacy XOrg mode (not Wayland), assuming 1 GPU and a dual screen setup

  • CUDA

Conventions

Laptop denotes instructions valid only for the laptop (Lenovo T480s) installation

Workstation denotes instructions valid only for the workstation

Table of content

The sections follow the Arch wiki installation guide organization.

  1. Preparation : EFI bios & windows 10 configuration before setting up Arch

  2. Partitionining : configuration of the Arch setup environment and disk partitioning

  3. Installation : base install + base configuration, gets you to a self booting basic command line

  4. Post-installation: Additional config for a viable self updating self booting command line

  5. Desktop environment: Xorg + Qtile + desktop applications, clean shell configuration with Zsh / Fish

  6. Dev environment: Common frameworks (Java, Python, CUDA), VSCode, Neovim

  7. GPG-SSH configuration: how to get GPG + SSH working with a Yubikey

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