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Basic questions before downloading, install procedure

Hi

Does this distro support a custom kernel? Can i boot from an existing grub into lvm2 / luks / ext4 root partition? Can I reuse my existing grub2?

What is the official installation guide when I want to chroot from an existing amd64 based distro? Which install media should i use for amd64

Very important. Does the package manager do not touch my corresponding boot related areas. That includes UEFI, my boot partition, my grub.cfg. Linux Mint like Windows nukes anything which is in the way to boot only linux mint or Windows for example !

Where can I lookup from a webbrowser which packages are available?

I need i3wm, bash, libreoffice, k3b, the usual browsers, xscreensaver, geany, eom, nvidia-drivers, wine, urbanterror, eudev + openrc, lxdm, caja, gimp, handbrake, vlc, pulseaudio + ffmpeg, nano, ddrescue, gparted, testdisc, binwalk, htop, top, wireshark, wpa_supplicant, dhcpcd, mc, linux steam, winetricks, git, gcc 7.2.0, gcc 5.4.0, adb

What i do not want: networkmanager, automounters, SYSTEMD, GNOME, nouveau and vesa open source X-11 drivers

Is there a possibility to hard mask, enforce a certain policy to restrict the installation of certain packages

Does this distro respects the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filesystem_Hierarchy_Standard

What does the distro do for config files in /etc. Are those overwritten without user intervention? or are they left unchanged?
Same question for /boot, /usr/src/linux

Let'S assume I create the user with same user-id, user-name and group-id. Should I be able to get on using my user as is, with saved browser passwords, user data and such?

Which implementation of ffmpeg does the distro use, ffmpeg or libav?

Does the distro ships a working gcc 7.2.0 with other needed "userland" to compile software? e.g. different python, ruby, lua
What is the recommended way to install something from git? e.g. certain games

edit: I need kernel branch 4.13 because of certain issues. 4.14 is as of now untested on my side. What i do not want is 4.12.x, 4.10 may work but I used it too long ago. 4.0 may work, but also used it ages ago

I want to hardmask grub or any bootloader in question in the repro. Especially update-grub, os-prober

Re: Basic questions before downloading, install procedure

Reply #1 –
We currently ony have the 4.9 lts kernel, but you can probably use Arch's latest 4.14 kernel, and it will probably work. This is an Arch linux based distro, so for a most of the info you want, browse through the Arch wiki and as for packages, you can look at Atrix's github page, but we still use some Arch repos, so it isn't complete yet; we're still transitioning.

Re: Basic questions before downloading, install procedure

Reply #2 –
This https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Install_from_existing_Linux does not really covers any of my questions.

The installation docs of ARCH linux are not going in many details, and they spread over several cross references.

Does the package manager replaces files in /etc /boot /usr/src MBR without asking the user during the update process?

Is the FHS respected?

Re: Basic questions before downloading, install procedure

Reply #3 –
Quote from: _roman_ – on
Does the package manager replaces files in /etc /boot /usr/src MBR without asking the user during the update process?

Well, that depends on the package, Artix uses pacman as package manager, pacman utilizes what is called the PKGBUILD file in order to compile and package software, in those files, package managers and distro developers add directives that provides the package of behavior. One of those directives is the backup one, this is an array of elements that indicates pacman that the files specified on it must be preserved because is probable that the user made modifications on them.

In the case of grub this is what is defined
Code: [Select]
backup=('boot/grub/grub.cfg'
        'etc/default/grub'
        'etc/grub.d/40_custom')

That means that all those paths are protected.

You can read Pacnew and Pacsave document in Archwiki and also the backup PKGBUILD documentation section.

For some other packages this is well, arbitrary, some packages backup config files some other doesn't, far from perfect if you ask me.

Quote from: _roman_ – on
Is the FHS respected?

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Frequently_asked_questions#Does_Arch_follow_the_FHS.3F  (just remove systemd from the equation)

Regards.

Re: Basic questions before downloading, install procedure

Reply #4 –
Thank you for your responses.

Gentoo screwed up with PIE enforcement and Profile 17 now.
Direct Rendering is broken and bugs are not fixed.
Gentoo is a distro where user reported bugs are resolved with
wont fix
resolved
report upstream
or are collecting dust
and old packages are not removed, even when you can say they are worthless, because the closed source game server does not allow any connections anymore, there is no public open source server available. tree cleaners just do not do their job.
I'm looking for something more stable, more tested more flexible as gentoo.


I'm downloading now freebsd.

I'm still not convinced which gnu linux I should use instead of gentoo.

There is nothing out there which uses luks / lvm2 / provides i3wm / a decent package manger / and a decent install handbook.

I read beforehand the install documentation. When that is missing, not complete, lacks the most necessary information. I dilsike those passages which says, follow the installer and such. Luks / lvm2 is hardly anywhere covered on those binary distros. I even looked into exotics like funtoo. After 12 years using gentoo I can say after readig the funtoo documentation, funtoo is definitely not gentoo. funtoo may be loosely based on gentoo. that's it. I'm allergic to prebuild kernels and initramfs, prebuild bootloaders and those bootloader scripts.

Anyway I mark it as solved.

Re: Basic questions before downloading, install procedure

Reply #5 –
Yeah, I was a Gentoo user for many years too, there is nothing as flexible as Gentoo on the Linux ecosystem but I don't beliebe FreeBSD is gonna be much better for you.

Good luck in your search.

Re: Basic questions before downloading, install procedure

Reply #6 –
Arch used to have something called the Beginner's guide that was much more detailed than the current Installation guide, but even this isn't too bad, it's just terse. You will have to read all the cross-referenced links.

I think this talks about your question:
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Frequently_asked_questions#Does_Arch_follow_the_FHS.3F

You are going to have to spend some time browsing the wiki if you really want to understand everything, but that is best done along with an installation, and while encountering issues with it. The only way you'll be able to decide if you like it is by trying it out.

Also, if you don't like pre-built kernels, your choices are very limited.