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Arch Linux Installation - Part Five

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1 Oct 2015CPOL3 min read 3.1K  
In this post we're going to be tying up some loose ends.

In this post we're going to be tying up some loose ends. So the first thing we need to do before we get started is login as root, give it a password then change our hostname.

Root Password Setup

To set a password for the root account use the following:

  • passwd EnterPasswordHere
  • Then type exit

Now login as root and type in the password you just created. Success!

Hostname Setup

Changing the hostname is extremely easy:

It is reccomended to have all lowercase letters for your hostname.

  • hostnamectl set-hostname EnterHostNameHere

Logout to test if the hostname was set properly:

  • exit

Login again as root. You should now see your new hostname!

Network Setup

Issue the following comand to set up network access:

  • dhcpcd

Test it out by pinging google:

  • ping www.google.com

Moving forward for this tutorial I will be using the xfce desktop environment but you can use whatever desktop environment you want; like gnome or kde. Also, I'm going to walk you guys through installing things that are necessary for most desktop environments.

Audio Setup

First we need to download alsa-utils:

  • pacman -S alsa-utils

Now type exit to get out of the root account and then login with your user account that we created in part four of this tutorial.

Once you're logged in with your user account issue the following command:

  • alsamixer

You can see that sound is completely muted for the system. In order to pump up the volume, use the arrow keys to navigate to the following channels:

  • Master
  • Master M
  • PCM

Then raise the gain on each of those channels to 0.00db. You can view the gain level at the top of the screen where it says item.

Once you're done press the escape key to exit and save your settings.

Setting Up GUI Packages

Type the following command:

  • sudo pacman -S xorg-server xorg-xinit xorg-server-utils mesa ttf-dejavu samba smbclient networkmanager networkmanager-vpnc networkmanager-pptp networkmanager-openconnect network-manager-applet gvfs gvfs-smb sshfs

Thanks to sudo you will be asked to enter your password so you can run the command. After doing so you will be asked to specify which provider to choose for libgl. Since I have a nvidia card, I chose it then pressed enter, then Y to proceed with the installation.

Video Card Driver Installation

Alright, so if you don't happen to know what video card you have in your machine here's a command that will tell you exactly what card you have:

  • lspci -k | grep -A 2 -i "VGA"

Now that you know what video card you have. Use one of the following commands that corresponds with your video card:

VirtualBox Graphics Adapter:

  • sudo pacman -S virtualbox-guest-utils

Intel Graphics:

  • sudo pacman -S xf86-video-intel

ATI Graphics:

  • sudo pacman -S xf86-video-ati

Nvidia Graphics:

  • sudo pacman -S nvidia

After you issue your chosen command, follow the prompts to install your video driver. Driver installation takes just a few seconds to complete.

Enabling the Network Manager

The last thing we want to do now is enable the network manager to start up as soon as the computer boots so that we'll have internet access once Arch has been booted.

  • sudo systemctl enable NetworkManager

Now reboot:

  • sudo reboot

Once you're back at the login command prompt, login with your user account.

To test out what we just did we will issue a ping command:

  • ping www.google.com

Success!

Wrap Up

So with everything finally setup, in the next part we will install the GUI so that we can interact with our computer via a mouse, play with an actual desktop and browse the internet.

License

This article, along with any associated source code and files, is licensed under The Code Project Open License (CPOL)


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