Name: "Jim" (JR) - the "JR" is from a job I had awhile back where there were two of us with the same name - both first and last! So, they called me "JR" As in the character from Dallas.
Computer Experience:
Ranges from programming FORTRAN on a (yuck!) IBM '026 keypunch, all the way to running a 10 Tbyte file server on a multi-core PC running Mint.
==================
Though in my case it involves a Raspberry Pi, I am sure this question applies to many other ARM architectures as well. Maybe there should be a tutorial somewhere?
I have installed Arch Linux (ARM) on my Raspberry Pi, model B, using the NOOBS (1.3.0) loader they generously provide over in Pi-land. I have logged in, and I have had the foresight to run both "pacman -Sy" and "pacman -Syu" to make sure that I am up to the minute.
Question:
What next?
If we assume I want to make my Pi into a [fill in the blank], precisely how to do this is not always clear. It seems that most of the non-GUI goodies are already installed as a part of the base system - including such gems as "mdadm".
My experience with other Linux distro's, both command-line and GUI based, is that there is usually a meta-package for the various major functional blocks. If, for example, I want to create a SMB based file server, there's usually a "samba" meta-package that brings in all the various bits-and-pieces that you need to start with. Installing Apache is the same - you install the Apache meta-package and it pulls in all the pieces you need to get, at the very least, a basic Apache web server up and running. Of course, once the initial packages are in, you have to do the customizations to fit your particular application or need.
I took a look at the Arch ARM repositories and there's a lot of stuff there. You want gnome, you got it! You want [such-and-so]? It's there too. But (IMHO) it appears to be impossibly fragmented into dozens of discrete pieces with no idea which to install first. And there does not seem to be any rhyme, reason, or guide to direct the unsuspecting user down The Path of Righteousness, so to speak.
In my own case, what I want to do - at least at the start - is to install a GUI based Arch system, running the Lxde, (Ldxe?) desktop, with some of my favorite apps installed, so that I can compare ArchARM with Raspberian, Pidora, and such like in a desktop type scenario. Does Arch ARM eat Raspberian's lunch? Does it slow to a crawl? Are there any other strange and interesting things that happen using a rolling release distribution rather than the distro's I am used to that have discrete version jumps? Having done that, I may nuke it and then try making a Windows-type file-server out of it. And then, maybe a web server, or a LAMP server. (No! I meant a BUD light!
)So, the Musical Question remains: Having installed the base Arch ARM system, where do I go from here to accomplish such-and-so task?
Thanks!
Jim (JR)
p.s. Yes, I *DID* try searching before I posted this. . . .