My love Affair with Arch Linux

[cod3poet]

What started with a minimal and complicated start with Slackware. Has evolved into a long running working relationship with and passion for Archlinux.

I always loved minimal and customizable systems So Arch fills that role nicely.

Granted it is a bleeding edge distro so a good 90% of the software on it is less than a year old.

Openbox - window manager
compton - compositor for shadows and true transparency
feh - imageviewer / wallpaper setter
Conky (stats on the right)
lxterm with no borders
vivaldi (fork of the old opera browser, I like it because you can scale the entire window to make it smaller and free up more screen space)
chromium
thunar (file manager)
atom (text editor)
tint2 for the taskbar
Transmission for torrent (deluge sometimes too)

I do a ton of work in web apps and in the terminal I rarely if ever use any other apps than that so KDE / GNOME are a little much for what I need.

And that is my typical linux box.

Othwerise I used Nginx, PHP-FPM, MariaDB, nodejs for my web stack.

Othwerise I have a ton of chmod +x shellcripts to help with day to day management or connecting to remote services

I also use Synergy so I can use one keyboard / mouse across my desktop and laptop at the same time.

[fox]

I have never tried Arch (other than from a derivative, Manjaro), but I do like the simplicity of openbox. I originally experienced it from Crunchbang, and later from Bunsenlabs Linux. Their versions of openbox are highly modified to make it more attractive and easier to use than the stock version. But recently I decided to see if I could make the stock version into a nice, usable desktop in Ubuntu. I ended up installing many of the same packages that you list below, plus a GUI configure app for openbox. The result was pretty good, and all of my apps work well on it. Someday when I have a bit more time and patience I'll try my hand at Arch.

[cod3poet]

Now If I can get images working this is what my primary arch box looks like however I have a ton of linux boxes out in the wild including Red-Hat and Centos.

[fox]

That looks very nice. What is the bar at the top?

[Jason]

Are you running it in a virtual machine?

[buster]

Have never met you cod3poet, but I'm guessing you're not a Newfoundland folk singer as the name implies. or an entrant in the annual Cap Cod poetry competition.

I did note the language construction you used which is unusual for young people. It also indicates an awareness of parallel construction which has gone out of fashion, but I think is powerful. The sentence included " evolved into a long running working relationship with and passion for Archlinux."

So did I guess right? Educated in English studies or maybe like me just a little older than some?

[cod3poet]

Oh you have met me, I was known as Peterborough Jesus for good reason, I was the slackware lad, who moved away and has since returned to town. I appreciate the compliment, the 3 is meant as a l33tsp34k E. As the original handle was from a T-shirt in the movie Anti Trust - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0218817/

I was in the old forums with the dark avatar with the dreads. In any case I have returned after too long. Still nerdy as ever. Last time I was out to a PLUG Mug Mr. Fox was having issues running osx as a vm on linux installed on a mac. Oh the irony of it all.

I am running windows 10 with Bash installed (running on a modified Ubuntu install) running Vmware with Archlinux installed (vmware is the top bar in the screenshot) with Powershell running on linux. Oh the further Irony.

In any case when you have an i7 with 32gigs of ram, that makes for a pretty vast playground for virtualization.

English studies, no. Philosophy yes, too many books yes. A real appreciation for words and the power they hold. And just old enough to have missed the millennial OMG iknowrite WTFflyingCheekenBOL! Bastardization of communication. I was a moderator on Darkforum.com from a dial up connection when I formed my first real appreciation for writing on the interweebs. (so maybe I am a bit of a Millennial dork after all).

[Jason]

I am running windows 10 with Bash installed (running on a modified Ubuntu install) running Vmware with Archlinux installed (vmware is the top bar in the screenshot) with Powershell running on linux. Oh the further Irony.

That is geeky as hell. Some people would ask "WTF! WHY?". I just nod approvingly at your insane skills, good sir.

[bobf]

And you really should come out to more PLUG Mugs - *and* tonight's meeting - we really don't get to see enough of you (and since Harry rarely comes to PLUG Mugs, you'll have to renew your acquaintance at the monthly...)

Good to hear from you!

[cod3poet]

Yes I do need to get out more, and more coffee for me always equals more code and cool things. Take this morning for instance. I was compiling code and pegging CPU's before I finished my first coffee. My poor laptop was working so hard it nuked the battery mid-compile.

Attached is my LXterm borderless as always (Alt+Drag and Alt+RightDrag to resize == heaven to me) and of course off to the right is my highly customized conky another staple of every fluxbox / openbox install I have ever run. I never was a fan of heavier more "full featured" desktops and I tried XFCE but it was still too much stuff for me. Maybe someday I will use a tiling window manager like TWM or i3 but I prefer per pixel control of where my windows are.

[cod3poet]

Cheater cheater cheaty mccheater.

My work computer / network. Yes this is some inception level stuff going on here.

[Jason]

What Desktop environment are you using in CentOS 7? I thought they had moved to Gnome 3 but it looks like Gnome 2 or something lighter.

[cod3poet]

Gnome 3.14.2 actually, not my desktop of choice but I have to build some Linux managed desktops for people on my team so they can learn linux and SSH and management of services like web servers. Eventually I may have my NOC folks using linux desktops. Once we become a little more security focused and need to start poking at the edges of networks.

Still <3 my Arch just needed something that was less bleeding edge and a little more enterprise friendly (also I have my zabbix install on a centos 7 bare metal server so bet to have a centos 7 Management box for it, test in the gui push to production.)

And I like a challenge so juggling Os's and getting them all to play nice is super fun for me.

[cod3poet]

Further progress on the box, I got the proprietary Nvidia drivers working at the cost of a 1920x1080 console at the beginning and some rather difficult DPI issues. However 3d acceleration and hardware acceleration of video is rocking, and I have to test external displays and blanking the laptop screen when closing the lid with an external connected. I have my CPU downscaled to a whopping 800 mhz on idle so that the nose and heat stay at a minimum. Big win over win10.

Current memory usage with
pulseaudio,
Network Manager,
Remmina (rdp connection)
and like 6 terminals
a synergy session
Openbox with Compton for transparency

336mb RAM usage.

The other thing that I did (I did a thing!) was to get pulseaudio ALSO running under windows 10 so I can now hear the audio from my laptop through the headset I have attached to my desktop. The reason for this is I use my desktop keyboard and mouse across the network to my laptop and thus it's really just a screen with dedicated resources. That I use to tear away and remote into my work "PC" when I have to be in the kitchen or on my Son's floor putting him to sleep.

Either way this is gearing up to be an AWESOME setup. I <3 Linux.

[cod3poet]

Next on the Agenda EMULATORS!!!!

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/RetroArch

http://www.emulationstation.org/

http://support.logitech.com/en_us/product/dual-action-gamepad

Because there is nothing more joyous than digging into an old game of Dr. Mario or Bubble Bobble to kill time. Emulation is the new solitaire although my workstation may not be a gaming rig, the graphics card is more than enough.

Also in the interest of reducing complexity, I have been able to eliminate some system tray times with Conky, I nuked the cbatticon tray item, and will be replacing the network manager tray icon with info in Conky as well, after that date at time.

So much goodness slowly creeping back. And super mega current Kernel as well.