Reinstalling Archlinux on a old Laptop

 

Yesterday I accidentally run rm -rf /  because everybody makes mistakes. 

each step is written here:

1 - first memtest86 

2 - swap memories, test one memory slot each time, and test a new one memory module from another laptop that it's working. So in this part I figure out that my laptop was broken, so Nico borrow me an old laptop :'-( .

3 - UEFI, installing Archlinux on UEFI require use the pen-drive on UEFI mode. after boot on UEFI mode, I did a back up to the files on the /home directory and install the Operative System again. 

4 - first I already have the partition so, this part is not new. the only thing with this new laptop is that I have to do a new UEFI partition to the grub, my old laptop does not have UEFI mode, so the grub was installed in the BIOS MBR sort of.
 

After I did the new UEFI Archlinux partition with "cfdisk /dev/sda" change Type to UEFI system, and verify if the notebook has a the boot mode UEFI listing this directory:

 

ls -l /sys/firmware/efi/efivars

 

If the output show you a list of files! Bingo you are currently booting in UEFI mode.

In UEFI we need the partition table in this Disklabel "GPT", so we check with

fdisk -l if the partition table is type BIOS or GPT. the output should be like:

"Disklabel type: gpt"

Also used parted -l to fix an error that was show up when we execute "fdisk -l": 

"something that GPT partition was different from MBR partition"

"GPT PMBR size mismatch" something like that.

 To do that: I installed parted 

$pacman -S parted && parted -l /dev/sda

 

 

5 -  After that I formatted the partitions to do a fresh installation.

mkswap /dev/sda6

swapon /dev/sda6 

mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda5 => /root

mkfs.vfat -F32 /dev/sda7 => /boot/grub/efi

6 - preparing for the chroot

from general to specify 

mount /dev/sda5 /mnt

mkdir -p /mnt/boot/efi

mount /dev/sda7 /mnt/boot/efi

7 - using pacstrap to install base system

pacstrap /mnt base base-devel grub os-prober ntfs-3g networkmanager efibootmgr gvfs gvfs-afc dhcpcd vim linux-headers linux-firmware linux  netctl wpa_supplicant xf86-input-synaptics pavucontrol htop lshw meld transmission-gtk docker docker-compose gvfs-mtp xdg-user-dirs lightdm  xorg xorg-xinit gnome-keyring xorg-server xorg-server-common xf86-video-vesa xorg-font-util  ttf-dejavu opencl-nvidia dkms git terminator rsync go-tools cinnamon-desktop cinnamon gnome-terminal lightdm-gtk-greeter  pulseaudio  pulseaudio-alsa firefox vlc  gimp xfburn gedit gnome-system-monitor faenza-icon-theme smartmontools

 

(xorg is an alias and in this case I installed ALL :O, just in case).

 

At first I did the install of nvidia and nvidia-utils  nvidia-304, driver BUT  doesn't have the correct version of the drivers that I need. so I have to uninstall later to install the correct one.

 

Something to remember if you install nvidia-lts you need to install kernel-lts and header-lts, and re run mkinitcpio -p.

 

nvidia-xconfig to set Xorg configuration.  See Also nvidia-settings and nvidia-smi.

 

nouveau-dri  I tried to install the open source driver but was a failed, after many modprobe and rmprobe  with nouveau and nvidia and debuging with modinfo -p video, lshw -c video, so I  install the legacy driver from an AUR package with the tool "yay" is a client writen on golang, and is easy to use and install from Cli.

    Cinnamon package to see sections:

    $ pacman -Ql cinnamon | awk -F '[_.]' '/cs_.+\.py/ {print $2}'

 

8 - generar fstab

genfstab -pU /mnt >> /mnt/etc/fstab

 

9 - the chroot to make some configurations and installing the grub in the new uefi partition.

arch-chroot /mnt

10 - without  GUI, setting configuration files, service, and customizations:

    hostname: 

        echo "CoolName" >> /etc/hostname

   Timezone:

       ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/America/Buenos_Aires  /etc/localtime

   Setting Locale:

       uncomment a line on this file "/etc/locale.gen" and run the command cli  $ locale-gen

   Setting keymap:

         localectl list-keymaps | grep -i us  (list all available keymaps)

         echo "KEYMAP=us" > /etc/vconsole.conf  (do the setting)

   Making grub config file:

         echo "GRUB_DISABLE_OS_PROBER=false" >> /etc/default/grub (edit /etc/default/grub)

         grub-install --efi-directory=/boot/efi --bootloader-id="Archlinux" --target=x86_64-efi --removable

         os-prober (testing if we have another OS like windows) 

         grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

    Adding a new user to use with sudo:

        useradd -m -g users -G audio,lp,optical,video,wheel,games,power,scanner -s /bin/bash j3nnn1

        passwd j3nnn1 

    Installing nvidia driver via Yay: 

        - git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/yay.git

        - cd yay

        - makepkg -si (don't forget to add this user to sudoers file)

        - if you run without -i use pacman -U package.gz (optional)

        - yay -S nvidia-390xx-dkms 

        - yay -S google-chrome 

        - yay -S numix-gtk-theme 

    Setting  Time:

        - timedatectl set-ntp true. (only if you did previously the setting of timezone on the file: /etc/localtime)

        - timedatectl timesync-status

        - timedatectl status

    Related to Kernel:

        - mkinitcpio -P 

    Enable display manager and network manager and GUI:

        - systemctl enable lightdm

        - systemctl enable NetworkManager

        - systemctl isolate  graphical.target ( testing graphical UI, on next reboot will be dismiss this change) 

        - systemctl set-default multi-user.target (CLI)

        - systemctl set-default graphical.target (GUI) 

        - systemctl get-default 

11 - enable GUI.

     - systemctl set-default graphical.target (GUI) 

12 - disable GUI (troubleshooting).

     - systemctl set-default multi-user.target (CLI)

13 - testing with startx (xorg-xinit and xorg-apps should be installed)

       - edit file "~/.xinitrc".  

            vim ~/.xinitrc 

            OR

            echo "exec cinnamon-session" > ~/.xinitrc

       - from CLI execute: startx

And That's all. 

By now..

Sorry about  the Spanglish and grammatical errors.

14 - tools nvidia

is loaded nvidia driver?

dkms install --no-depmod nvidia/390.144 -k 5.15.3-arch1-1 && depmod 5.15.3-arch1-1

Logs

cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log

Blacklist noveau

caracas# cat /usr/lib/modprobe.d/nvidia-390xx-dkms.conf
blacklist nouveau 

When The Xorg Server API is not compatible with the driver:

caracas# cat /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/20-server_flags.conf

Section "ServerFlags"
    Option "IgnoreABI" "1"
EndSection

cat /usr/lib/modprobe.d/nvidia-lts.conf

update nvidia driver with new API

 ..@TODO

References: 

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/NVIDIA#Installation

gdm locked user.

vim /etc/security/faillock.conf

deny = 9999

python, virtualenv y no hay problema!

Instalar virtualenv.

pip install virtualenv
o 
por el gestor de paquetes.
python2-virtualenv-clone
python2-virtualenv

Creando un entorno virtual.

mkdir ~/virtualenvs/blog/
virtualenv ~/virtualenvs/blog/ --no-site-packages -p /usr/bin/python2virtualenv --no-site-packages nombreEntorno : Esta opcion hace que el entorno virtual se instale sin tomar en cuenta los paquetes del sistema operativo.
virtualenv --python=python3.1 nombreEntorno: Para que use un python específico.

Listar los ambientes virtualenvs.

   Porque menciono esto ya que la costumbre de usar rvm o perlbrew es poder listar las diferentes versiones del lenguaje que ya tengo instalada, por lo que no existe una única forma de hacer esto, ya que esto NO te instala diferentes versiones de python en tu SO, sino crea entornos virtuales para cada aplicación haciendo más limpia su implementación, por ejemplo tengo en mi SO dos versiones de python, puedo instalar estas dos versiones en mi ambiente local. Lo más recomendable es hacer un directorio donde almacenar todos los entornos virtuales.

Activando el entorno virtual.

cd ~/virtualenvs/mysite.com
source bin/activate

Desactivando el entorno virtual (Dejar de usar el python local). 

deactive 

Como funciona un entorno virtual.

Cuando uno crea un entorno, dentro del mismo se crean tres carpetas:

bin: cuando uno tiene el entorno activado, y ejecuta un comando como python, pip o easy_install, se ejecuta alguno de los binarios que se encuentran en esa carpeta, en vez de ejecutar los del sistema.
include: es simplemente un link al a los archivos de la instalación de Python.
Un link a algunos archivos de Python. En este caso a los .py
Una carpeta, site-packages, que es donde se instalan los paquetes cuando uno usa pip o easy_install

lib: esta es otra carpeta importante. Al igual que include tiene una carpeta llamada python pero a diferencia de include, esta no es una link a la carpeta de Python. La carpeta tiene dos cosas importantes:

Instalar Modulos en el entorno virtual.

pip install psycopg2

pip install numpy

pip install rpy2

Usando un wrapper para agilizar la utilización del entorno virtual.

usar: http://virtualenvwrapper.readthedocs.org/en/latest/


Servidor que contiene binarios no oficiales para python y windows

http://www.lfd.uci.edu/~gohlke/pythonlibs/


Referencias de:
 
Un tutorial genial para instalar virtualenv y como funciona:
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Python_VirtualEnv

referencia al titulo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21fRA1VrLPo :)

adorable  alf