Build an Arch Linux environment on Raspberry Pi

Introduction

In this article, I will describe the process of building an Arch Linux environment on Raspberry pi 3 Model B (because my Raspberry Pi is 3 Model B). The version is a little old, but I don't think the installation procedure will change much compared to the latest version of Raspberry Pi 4. This article is for anyone who wants to run Arch Linux on a version 3 or later Raspberry Pi.

What kind of environment will be created in the end?

The environment as shown in the image below is completed. I used Xfce for the desktop environment.

Installation procedure

It consists of 3 parts.

=== Perform with linux prepared in the virtual environment === Chapter 1. Write partition and file system settings to microSD card

=== Working with Raspberry Pi === Chapter 2. Various settings such as locale, keyboard, network, user addition, time, Xorg, desktop environment, etc. Chapter 3. Customization on the desktop environment of your choice

Chapter 1

In this chapter we will build an arch Linux partition and file system on a microSD card. It's almost the same as the official installation procedure, but I think you can follow the sequence. Any OS will do as long as you can use commands such as fdisk, mount, and tar. However, if you want to do it safely without getting hurt, I think it is better to prepare linux on a virtual environment such as VirtualBox or VMware. I did it on windows with Zorin OS 15.2 Lite (free) in the virtual environment of VirtualBox.

The explanation in Chapter 1 will do almost the same as the formula below. Raspberry Pi 3 | Arch Linux ARM https://archlinuxarm.org/platforms/armv8/broadcom/raspberry-pi-3 Raspberry Pi 4 | Arch Linux ARM https://archlinuxarm.org/platforms/armv8/broadcom/raspberry-pi-4

Construction of new partition and file system

I'm currently opening a terminal with Zorin OS 15.2 Lite installed in a virtual environment. Switch to root with su.

First, if the microSD card mounts automatically, you need to unmount it. Check the current mount status with mount. When I check the last line, it is still mounted automatically.

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# mount
...
...
/dev/sdb1 on /media/hibi21b/B1FD-E84D type vfat (rw,nosuid,nodev,relatime,uid=1000,gid=1000,fmask=0022,dmask=0022,codepage=437,iocharset=iso8859-1,shortname=mixed,showexec,utf8,flush,errors=remount-ro,uhelper=udisks2)

Unmount with ʻumount / dev / sdb1`. I want to mount the boot directory on / dev / sdb1 later, so I need to remove it.

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# umount /dev/sdb1

If you are using Zorin OS 15.2 Lite, uncheck Removable Storage as it will be mounted automatically after a certain period of time even if you umount it.

Check for currently available block devices

You can check it with the lsblk command. I'm using a 16GB microSD card (I should have kept it around 128GB).

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# lsblk
NAME   MAJ:MIN RM  SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda      8:0    0   96G  0 disk 
└─sda1   8:1    0   96G  0 part /
sdb      8:16   1   15G  0 disk 
└─sdb1   8:17   1   15G  0 part 
sr0     11:0    1 1024M  0 rom  

Also check with fdisk -l. This time, the block device of the microSD card was / dev / sdb, but / dev / sdc etc. may change, so please read it in that case.

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# fdisk -l
Disk /dev/sda: 96 GiB, 103079215104 bytes, 201326592 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: dos
Disk identifier: 0xee589588

Device     Boot Start       End   Sectors Size Id Type
/dev/sda1  *     2048 201324543 201322496  96G 83 Linux


Disk /dev/sdb: 15 GiB, 16118710272 bytes, 31481856 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: dos
Disk identifier: 0xe5e4a4e3

Device     Boot Start      End  Sectors Size Id Type
/dev/sdb1        8192 31481855 31473664  15G  c W95 FAT32 (LBA)

Create a new partition

Do as officially. Wherever there is a <----------, you have to enter it yourself.

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# fdisk /dev/sdb

Welcome to fdisk (util-linux 2.31.1).
Changes will remain in memory only, until you decide to write them.
Be careful before using the write command.


Command (m for help): o    <----------
Created a new DOS disklabel with disk identifier 0x7fa48a0b.

Command (m for help): p    <----------View partition table
Disk /dev/sdb: 15 GiB, 16118710272 bytes, 31481856 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: dos
Disk identifier: 0x7fa48a0b

Command (m for help): n    <----------
Partition type
   p   primary (0 primary, 0 extended, 4 free)
   e   extended (container for logical partitions)
Select (default p): p    <----------
Partition number (1-4, default 1):     <----------
First sector (2048-31481855, default 2048):     <----------
Last sector, +sectors or +size{K,M,G,T,P} (2048-31481855, default 31481855): +100M   <----------

Created a new partition 1 of type 'Linux' and of size 100 MiB.

Command (m for help): t    <----------
Selected partition 1
Hex code (type L to list all codes): c    <----------
Changed type of partition 'Linux' to 'W95 FAT32 (LBA)'.

Command (m for help): n    <----------
Partition type
   p   primary (1 primary, 0 extended, 3 free)
   e   extended (container for logical partitions)
Select (default p): p    <----------
Partition number (2-4, default 2):     <----------
First sector (206848-31481855, default 206848):     <----------
Last sector, +sectors or +size{K,M,G,T,P} (206848-31481855, default 31481855):     <----------

Created a new partition 2 of type 'Linux' and of size 14.9 GiB.

Command (m for help): w    <----------
The partition table has been altered.
Calling ioctl() to re-read partition table.
Syncing disks.

Check / dev / sdb again

You can see that you have a new partition by doing fdisk -l.

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# fdisk -l
...
...

Disk /dev/sdb: 15 GiB, 16118710272 bytes, 31481856 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: dos
Disk identifier: 0x7fa48a0b

Device     Boot  Start      End  Sectors  Size Id Type
/dev/sdb1         2048   206847   204800  100M  c W95 FAT32 (LBA)
/dev/sdb2       206848 31481855 31275008 14.9G 83 Linux

Creating and mounting a FAT file system

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# mkfs.vfat /dev/sdb1
mkfs.fat 4.1 (2017-01-24)
root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# mkdir boot
root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# mount /dev/sdb1 boot

Creating and mounting an ext4 file system

mkfs.ext4 / dev / sdb2 will take some time.

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# mkfs.ext4 /dev/sdb2
mke2fs 1.44.1 (24-Mar-2018)
Creating filesystem with 3909376 4k blocks and 979200 inodes
Filesystem UUID: 8371c867-4a52-4ebb-9e3a-40d20ac0c161
Superblock backups stored on blocks: 
	32768, 98304, 163840, 229376, 294912, 819200, 884736, 1605632, 2654208

Allocating group tables: done                            
Writing inode tables: done                            
Creating journal (16384 blocks): done
Writing superblocks and filesystem accounting information: done   

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# mkdir root
root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# mount /dev/sdb2 root

Check if it is mounted

Check with mount

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# mount
...
...
/dev/sdb1 on /home/hibi21b/boot type vfat (rw,relatime,fmask=0022,dmask=0022,codepage=437,iocharset=iso8859-1,shortname=mixed,errors=remount-ro)
/dev/sdb2 on /home/hibi21b/root type ext4 (rw,relatime)

get tarball

Get the tarball with wget. The tarball you get depends on the version of Raspberry Pi. wget http://os.archlinuxarm.org/os/ArchLinuxARM-rpi-XXX-latest.tar.gz

Please check the formula again Raspberry Pi 3 | Arch Linux ARM https://archlinuxarm.org/platforms/armv8/broadcom/raspberry-pi-3 Raspberry Pi 4 | Arch Linux ARM https://archlinuxarm.org/platforms/armv8/broadcom/raspberry-pi-4

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# wget http://os.archlinuxarm.org/os/ArchLinuxARM-rpi-2-latest.tar.gz
...
...
Saving to: ‘ArchLinuxARM-rpi-2-latest.tar.gz’

ArchLinuxARM-rpi-2-latest.tar.gz                  100%[============================================================================================================>] 445.14M  1.24MB/s    in 6m 53s  

2020-05-08 21:23:50 (1.08 MB/s) - ‘ArchLinuxARM-rpi-2-latest.tar.gz’ saved [466758916/466758916]

I got a tarball. Although it is rpi-2, it started normally even with Raspberry Pi 3 Model B.

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# ls
ArchLinuxARM-rpi-2-latest.tar.gz  boot  Desktop  Documents  Downloads  Music  Pictures  Public  root  Templates  Videos

Defrost

Officially I use bsdtar, but I used the tar command. I didn't add the tar zxvf Arch ... and the v option because all the details would be displayed in the terminal. The meaning of -C root is to unzip under the root directory (which is the mount point of / dev / sdb2). -C is uppercase.

This will take some time.

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# tar zxf ArchLinuxARM-rpi-2-latest.tar.gz -C root
tar: Ignoring unknown extended header keyword 'LIBARCHIVE.xattr.security.capability'
tar: Ignoring unknown extended header keyword 'LIBARCHIVE.xattr.security.capability'
tar: Ignoring unknown extended header keyword 'LIBARCHIVE.xattr.security.capability'
root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b#

You can see that it has been unzipped.

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# ls root/
bin  boot  dev  etc  home  lib  lost+found  mnt  opt  proc  root  run  sbin  srv  sys  tmp  usr  var

sync Please refer to the following site for detailed explanations.

sync command|Linux Technician Certified Linux| LPI-Japan https://linuc.org/study/knowledge/413/

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# sync

Move

What I'm doing is simple, but the directory name is confusing, so I made a diagram.

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# mv root/boot/* boot

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# ls boot/
bcm2709-rpi-2-b.dtb       bcm2836-rpi-2-b.dtb       config.txt    fixup_cd.dat         kernel7.img   start4x.elf
bcm2710-rpi-2-b.dtb       bcm2837-rpi-3-b.dtb       fixup4cd.dat  fixup.dat            overlays      start_cd.elf
bcm2710-rpi-3-b.dtb       bcm2837-rpi-3-b-plus.dtb  fixup4.dat    fixup_db.dat         start4cd.elf  start_db.elf
bcm2710-rpi-3-b-plus.dtb  bootcode.bin              fixup4db.dat  fixup_x.dat          start4db.elf  start.elf
bcm2710-rpi-cm3.dtb       cmdline.txt               fixup4x.dat   initramfs-linux.img  start4.elf    start_x.elf
root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# ls root/boot/
root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# 

Unmount

Finally, unmount the boot and root mount points.

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# mount
/dev/sdb1 on /home/hibi21b/boot type vfat (rw,relatime,fmask=0022,dmask=0022,codepage=437,iocharset=iso8859-1,shortname=mixed,errors=remount-ro)
/dev/sdb2 on /home/hibi21b/root type ext4 (rw,relatime)

root@hibi221b:/home/hibi21b# umount boot root

This is the end of the work in Chapter 1. Remove the microSD card. It's okay to have the virtual environment closed as well.

Chapter 2

From Chapter 2 onwards, you will be working on the Raspberry Pi. Insert the microSD card into the Raspberry Pi and start it. Officially, the initial password for root is root.

** After setting, please perform reboot at an appropriate timing. ** **

keyboard

loadkeys jp106 will not be in Japanese layout if you reboot with temporary settings, so it is better to set it in localectl as well.

Console keyboard settings-ArchWiki https://wiki.archlinux.jp/index.php/%E3%82%B3%E3%83%B3%E3%82%BD%E3%83%BC%E3%83%AB%E3%81%A7%E3%81%AE%E3%82%AD%E3%83%BC%E3%83%9C%E3%83%BC%E3%83%89%E8%A8%AD%E5%AE%9A

[root@alarmpi ~]# loadkeys jp106
[root@alarmpi ~]# localectl set-keymap jp106
[root@alarmpi ~]# localectl //Verification

Change root user password

Now that you can enter the keys correctly, change the password of the root user.

[root@alarmpi ~]# passwd root

audit If a message like ʻaudit: xxxxxxxappears, it interferes with the work and I didn't like it, so I will stop it with a mask. To cancel it, usesystemctl unmask XXX`.

Arch Linux ARM · View topic --How disable AUDIT messages https://archlinuxarm.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=60&t=13175

[root@alarmpi ~]# systemctl mask systemd-journald-audit.socket
Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/systemd-journald-audit.socket -> /dev/null
[root@alarmpi ~]# reboot

Locale

Add the system locale. Open the config file with nano /etc/locale.gen and uncomment the following two. You can use vi, but there are fewer accidents if you use nano.

• en_US.UTF-8
• ja_JP.UTF-8

If you select ja_JP.UTF-8 instead of en_US.UTF-8 and reboot, the characters will be garbled, so set ʻen_US.UTF-8`.

Locale --ArchWiki https://wiki.archlinux.jp/index.php/%E3%83%AD%E3%82%B1%E3%83%BC%E3%83%AB Mastering GNU nano-Qiita https://qiita.com/snct_hu/items/971d512c26dd8b3a3b3c

[root@alarmpi ~]# nano /etc/locale.gen
[root@alarmpi ~]# locale-gen
[root@alarmpi ~]# localectl set-locale en_US.UTF-8
[root@alarmpi ~]# localectl //Check if it is reflected

network

Here, set the wireless LAN. Those who use wired need to check separately. Examine the wireless interface with ʻiw dev. The result is Interface wlan0, which turns out to be wlan0`.

[root@alarmpi ~]# iw dev

Use the wpa_passphrase command to encrypt the wifi password and write it to the new config file. The configuration file name should be in the following format.

/etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant-interface name.conf For wpa_supplicant, use an underscore and a hyphen before the interface name.

[root@alarmpi ~]#　wpa_passphrase "MYSSID" "passphrase" > /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant-wlan0.conf

When you open /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant-wlan0.conf, the password is commented in plain text, so delete that part.

WPA supplicant - ArchWiki https://wiki.archlinux.jp/index.php/WPA_supplicant#wpa_passphrase_.E3.81.A7.E6.8E.A5.E7.B6.9A.E3.81.99.E3.82.8B

[root@alarmpi ~]# nano /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant-wlan0.conf

---------In the configuration file
network={
    ssid="MYSSID"
    #psk="passphrase"　<---Erase this one line
    psk=xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
}
---------

Enable wireless at boot time.

--systemctl enable wpa_supplicant @ interface name --systemctl enable dhcpcd @ interface name

[root@alarmpi ~]# systemctl enable wpa_supplicant@wlan0
Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/multi-user.target.wants/[email protected] -> /usr/lib/systemd/system/[email protected].

[root@alarmpi ~]# systemctl enable dhcpcd@wlan0
Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/multi-user.target.wants/[email protected] -> /usr/lib/systemd/system/[email protected]

After reboot, check wlan0 with ʻifconfig or ʻip addr show

DNSSEC After finishing the network settings and trying ping -c5 8.8.8.8 etc., this works fine. However, ping -c5 google.com does not pass. You can find the cause of this in systemctl status /etc/systemd/resolved.conf. The solution can be found at the following site.

systemd-resolved - ArchWiki https://wiki.archlinux.jp/index.php/Systemd-resolved#DNSSEC Raspberry DNS problems with ArchLinuxARM and DNSSEC | madflex https://madflex.de/posts/raspberry-dns-problems-with-archlinuxarm-and-dnssec/

Disable DNSSEC. Add it to /etc/systemd/resolved.conf.

[root@alarmpi ~]# echo "DNSSEC=false" >> /etc/systemd/resolved.conf
[root@alarmpi ~]# cat /etc/systemd/resolved.conf
...
...
DNSSEC=false 

Please reboot.

Time zone

Check if the time zone: Asia / Tokyo is set with timedatectl.

Time --ArchWiki https://wiki.archlinux.jp/index.php/%E6%99%82%E5%88%BB

[root@alarmpi ~]# timedatectl set-timezone Asia/Tokyo

Times of Day

Japan Standard Time (JST) Group https://jjy.nict.go.jp/tsp/PubNtp/index.html systemd-timesyncd - ArchWiki https://wiki.archlinux.jp/index.php/Systemd-timesyncd

[root@alarmpi ~]# nano /etc/systemd/timesyncd.conf

---------In the configuration file
#NTP=
NTP=ntp.ncit.jp //Change Uncomment and specify server
---------

[root@alarmpi ~]# timedatectl set-ntp true
[root@alarmpi ~]# reboot

Change host name

[root@alarmpi ~]# nano /etc/hostname

---------In the configuration file
alarmpi  <--Erase
hibi221b <--add to
---------

Then reboot. The host name has changed.

[root@hibi221b ~]# 

Add / remove users

Create a general user other than the root user.

Add with the ʻuseradd` command.

---m Create home directory ** * Be sure to add ** </ font> ---d Home directory location ---s Login shell is now bash --Finally, specify the user name.

[root@hibi221b ~]# useradd -m -d /home/hibi221b -s /bin/bash hibi221b

[root@hibi221b ~]# passwd hibi221b

[root@hibi221b ~]# cat /etc/passwd

[root@hibi221b ~]# ls /home
alarm hibi221b
[root@hibi221b ~]# userdel -r alarm

[root@hibi221b ~]# cat /etc/passwd
[root@hibi221b ~]# ls /home
hibi221b

[root@hibi221b ~]# pacman-key --init 
[root@hibi221b ~]# pacman-key --populate archlinuxarm
[root@hibi221b ~]# pacman -Syu

[root@hibi221b ~]# pacman -S xorg-server xorg-xinit xorg-apps xorg-twm xterm mesa xf86-video-fbdev xf86-video-amdgpu

[root@hibi221b ~]# pacman -S vim sudo
[root@hibi221b ~]# export EDITOR=vim
[root@hibi221b ~]# visudo

---------In the configuration file
##
## User privilege specification
##
root ALL=(ALL) ALL
hibi221b ALL=(ALL) ALL   <----------Add this line
---------

[root@hibi221b ~]# pacman -S lightdm lightdm-gtk-greeter
[root@hibi221b ~]# systemctl enable lightdm
Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/display-manager.service -> /usr/lib/systemd/system/lightdm.service

[root@hibi221b ~]# pacman -S xfce4 xfce4-goodies

[root@hibi221b ~]# which startxfce4
/usr/bin/startxfce4
[root@hibi221b ~]# startxfce4

[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ sudo pacman -S xscreensaver

[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ sudo pacman -S fcitx fcitx-mozc fcitx-configtool fcitx-im otf-ipafont
[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ vim .xprofile

--------- .Added 3 lines in xprofile config file
export GTK_IM_MODULE=fcitx
export QT_IM_MODULE=fcitx
export XMODIFIERS=@im=fcitx
---------

[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ reboot

[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ sudo pacman -S firefox chromium

[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ sudo pacman -S base-devel git go
[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/yay.git
[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ cd yay
[hibi221b@hibi221b yay]$ makepkg -si
[hibi221b@hibi221b yay]$ which yay
/usr/bin/yay

[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/vscodium-bin.git
[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ cd vscodium-bin
[hibi221b@hibi221b vscodium-bin]$ makepkg -si 
[hibi221b@hibi221b vscodium-bin]$ which vscodium
/usr/bin/vscodium

[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ mkdir .icons
[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ cd Downloads
[hibi221b@hibi221b Downloads]$ ls
McMojave-circle-yellow.tar.xz
[hibi221b@hibi221b Downloads]$ tar Jxf McMojave-circle-yellow.tar.xz
[hibi221b@hibi221b Downloads]$ ls
McMojave-circle-yellow.tar.xz McMojave-circle-yellow McMojave-circle-yellow-dark
[hibi221b@hibi221b Downloads]$ mv McMojave-circle-yellow McMojave-circle-yellow-dark ../.icons/

[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ mkdir .themes
[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ cd Downloads
[hibi221b@hibi221b Downloads]$ ls
Material-Black-Pistachio_1.8.1.zip

[hibi221b@hibi221b Downloads]$ sudo pacman -S unzip

[hibi221b@hibi221b Downloads]$ unzip Material-Black-Pistachio_1.8.1.zip
[hibi221b@hibi221b Downloads]$ mv Material-Black-Pistachio ../.themes/

[hibi221b@hibi221b Downloads]$ ls
arch_dark_blue.png
[hibi221b@hibi221b Downloads]$ sudo mv arch_dark_blue.png /usr/share/backgrounds/xfce/

[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ su
[root@hibi221b ~]# localectl set-locale ja_JP.UTF-8
[root@hibi221b ~]# reboot

[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ sudo pacman -S neofetch
[hibi221b@hibi221b ~]$ neofetch