Arch linux from source

Install Software in Arch Linux from Source, using AUR or ABS

Written by Guillermo Garron
Date: 2012-02-22 16:00:00 00:00

I really like Arch Linux a lot, it is my favorite distribution, one thing I like a lot, is how easy is to install software from sources, and configure it to fit your needs.

We will see two ways of doing that, the first one is when the software is available in the official Arch Linux repositories. The second is when the software is not in the official Arch Linux repositories.

For the first one we will use ABS (Arch Build System) and for the second we will use AUR (Arch User Repository).

Let’s start with the needed packages for both methods, so open a console and be sure you have an up to date system

Then install these software pieces

Now we are ready to start

ABS (Arch Build System)

First thing is to install ABS

Then populate your disk

Wait a little as this step may take some time, depending on your internet connection. Now create a folder to build your software, let’s name it build, logged as your user, not as root run:

Now enter your newly created folder

And copy there the contents of the application you would like to build, let’s say nginx

Enter the nginx folder, and build the software

You may have to enter your password, once finished you will be able to install the software with:

AUR (Arch User Repository)

Now let’s check out how to install software using the Arch User Repository or AUR. The steps are almost the same:

First go to the AUR page and look for the software you want to install. Let’s say jekyll, now you can download the tarbal file, and copy it in your

/build folder. So continuing with our example:

De-compress the file.

Enter in the newly created folder

And build the program

If you have all the dependencies installed, you will end up with a package to install, just like in the above example. If not, pacman will try to install them for you, if they are not in the official repository, you will end up with an error like this: ==> ERROR: ‘pacman’ failed to install missing dependencies. In the case of this example, I had to install firs using the same system (AUR) ruby-albino , ruby-posix-spawn , ruby-classifier , ruby-fast-stemmer , ruby-directory_watcher , ruby-kramdown-last , ruby-liquid , ruby-maruku , ruby-syntax and ruby-redcloth , before I can actually install jekyll. I know the official way to install jekyll is not this one, but I’m using it just as an example.

Once you have all that satisfied, you can actually install the program

I hope you may find this tutorial, useful. and with no intention, I’m also showing you how to install jekyll in Arch Linux, the Arch Linux way :).

If you enjoyed the article, please share it

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Installation guide

This document is a guide for installing Arch Linux using the live system booted from an installation medium made from an official installation image. The installation medium provides accessibility features which are described on the page Install Arch Linux with accessibility options. For alternative means of installation, see Category:Installation process.

Before installing, it would be advised to view the FAQ. For conventions used in this document, see Help:Reading. In particular, code examples may contain placeholders (formatted in italics ) that must be replaced manually.

For more detailed instructions, see the respective ArchWiki articles or the various programs’ man pages, both linked from this guide. For interactive help, the IRC channel and the forums are also available.

Arch Linux should run on any x86_64-compatible machine with a minimum of 512 MiB RAM, though more memory is needed to boot the live system for installation.[1] A basic installation should take less than 2 GiB of disk space. As the installation process needs to retrieve packages from a remote repository, this guide assumes a working internet connection is available.

Contents

Pre-installation

Acquire an installation image

Visit the Download page and, depending on how you want to boot, acquire the ISO file or a netboot image, and the respective GnuPG signature.

Verify signature

It is recommended to verify the image signature before use, especially when downloading from an HTTP mirror, where downloads are generally prone to be intercepted to serve malicious images.

On a system with GnuPG installed, do this by downloading the PGP signature (under Checksums in the Download page) to the ISO directory, and verifying it with:

Alternatively, from an existing Arch Linux installation run:

Prepare an installation medium

The installation image can be supplied to the target machine via a USB flash drive, an optical disc or a network with PXE: follow the appropriate article to prepare yourself an installation medium from the chosen image.

Boot the live environment

1. Point the current boot device to the one which has the Arch Linux installation medium. Typically it is achieved by pressing a key during the POST phase, as indicated on the splash screen. Refer to your motherboard’s manual for details.
2. When the installation medium’s boot loader menu appears, select Arch Linux install medium and press Enter to enter the installation environment.

To switch to a different console—for example, to view this guide with Lynx alongside the installation—use the Alt+arrow shortcut. To edit configuration files, mcedit(1) , nano and vim are available. See packages.x86_64 for a list of the packages included in the installation medium.

Set the console keyboard layout

The default console keymap is US. Available layouts can be listed with:

To modify the layout, append a corresponding file name to loadkeys(1) , omitting path and file extension. For example, to set a German keyboard layout:

Console fonts are located in /usr/share/kbd/consolefonts/ and can likewise be set with setfont(8) .

Verify the boot mode

To verify the boot mode, list the efivars directory:

If the command shows the directory without error, then the system is booted in UEFI mode. If the directory does not exist, the system may be booted in BIOS (or CSM) mode. If the system did not boot in the mode you desired, refer to your motherboard’s manual.

Connect to the internet

To set up a network connection in the live environment, go through the following steps:

• Ensure your network interface is listed and enabled, for example with ip-link(8) :
• For wireless and WWAN, make sure the card is not blocked with rfkill.
• Connect to the network:
  • Ethernet—plug in the cable.
  • Wi-Fi—authenticate to the wireless network using iwctl.
  • Mobile broadband modem—connect to the mobile network with the mmcli utility.
• Configure your network connection:
  • DHCP: dynamic IP address and DNS server assignment (provided by systemd-networkd and systemd-resolved) should work out of the box for Ethernet, WLAN and WWAN network interfaces.
  • Static IP address: follow Network configuration#Static IP address.
• The connection may be verified with ping:

Update the system clock

Use timedatectl(1) to ensure the system clock is accurate:

To check the service status, use timedatectl status .

Partition the disks

When recognized by the live system, disks are assigned to a block device such as /dev/sda , /dev/nvme0n1 or /dev/mmcblk0 . To identify these devices, use lsblk or fdisk.

Results ending in rom , loop or airoot may be ignored.

The following partitions are required for a chosen device:

If you want to create any stacked block devices for LVM, system encryption or RAID, do it now.

Use fdisk or parted to modify partition tables. For example:

Example layouts

BIOS with MBR

Mount point	Partition	Partition type	Suggested size
[SWAP]	/dev/swap_partition	Linux swap	More than 512 MiB
/mnt	/dev/root_partition	Linux	Remainder of the device

UEFI with GPT

Mount point	Partition	Partition type	Suggested size
/mnt/boot or /mnt/efi 1	/dev/efi_system_partition	EFI system partition	At least 260 MiB
[SWAP]	/dev/swap_partition	Linux swap	More than 512 MiB
/mnt	/dev/root_partition	Linux x86-64 root (/)	Remainder of the device

1. /mnt/efi should only be considered if the used boot loader is capable of loading the kernel and initramfs images from the root volume. See the warning in Arch boot process#Boot loader.

Format the partitions

Once the partitions have been created, each newly created partition must be formatted with an appropriate file system. For example, to create an Ext4 file system on /dev/root_partition , run:

If you created a partition for swap, initialize it with mkswap(8) :

Mount the file systems

Mount the root volume to /mnt . For example, if the root volume is /dev/root_partition :

Create any remaining mount points (such as /mnt/efi ) using mkdir(1) and mount their corresponding volumes.

If you created a swap volume, enable it with swapon(8) :

genfstab(8) will later detect mounted file systems and swap space.

Installation

Select the mirrors

Packages to be installed must be downloaded from mirror servers, which are defined in /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist . On the live system, after connecting to the internet, reflector updates the mirror list by choosing 20 most recently synchronized HTTPS mirrors and sorting them by download rate.[2]

The higher a mirror is placed in the list, the more priority it is given when downloading a package. You may want to inspect the file to see if it is satisfactory. If it is not, edit the file accordingly, and move the geographically closest mirrors to the top of the list, although other criteria should be taken into account.

This file will later be copied to the new system by pacstrap, so it is worth getting right.

Install essential packages

Use the pacstrap(8) script to install the base package, Linux kernel and firmware for common hardware:

The base package does not include all tools from the live installation, so installing other packages may be necessary for a fully functional base system. In particular, consider installing:

• userspace utilities for the management of file systems that will be used on the system,
• utilities for accessing RAID or LVM partitions,
• specific firmware for other devices not included in linux-firmware (e.g. sof-firmware for sound cards),
• software necessary for networking,
• a text editor,
• packages for accessing documentation in man and info pages: man-db , man-pages and texinfo .

To install other packages or package groups, append the names to the pacstrap command above (space separated) or use pacman while chrooted into the new system. For comparison, packages available in the live system can be found in packages.x86_64.

Configure the system

Fstab

Generate an fstab file (use -U or -L to define by UUID or labels, respectively):

Check the resulting /mnt/etc/fstab file, and edit it in case of errors.

Chroot

Change root into the new system:

Time zone

Run hwclock(8) to generate /etc/adjtime :

This command assumes the hardware clock is set to UTC. See System time#Time standard for details.

Localization

Edit /etc/locale.gen and uncomment en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8 and other needed locales. Generate the locales by running:

Network configuration

Add matching entries to hosts(5) :

If the system has a permanent IP address or a fully qualified domain name, see the example in Network configuration#Local hostname resolution.

Complete the network configuration for the newly installed environment, that may include installing suitable network management software.

Initramfs

Creating a new initramfs is usually not required, because mkinitcpio was run on installation of the kernel package with pacstrap.

For LVM, system encryption or RAID, modify mkinitcpio.conf(5) and recreate the initramfs image:

Root password

Boot loader

Choose and install a Linux-capable boot loader. If you have an Intel or AMD CPU, enable microcode updates in addition.

Reboot

Exit the chroot environment by typing exit or pressing Ctrl+d .

Optionally manually unmount all the partitions with umount -R /mnt : this allows noticing any «busy» partitions, and finding the cause with fuser(1) .

Finally, restart the machine by typing reboot : any partitions still mounted will be automatically unmounted by systemd. Remember to remove the installation medium and then login into the new system with the root account.

Post-installation

See General recommendations for system management directions and post-installation tutorials (like creating unprivileged user accounts, setting up a graphical user interface, sound or a touchpad).

For a list of applications that may be of interest, see List of applications.

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Arch Build System

The Arch build system is a ports-like system for building and packaging software from source code. While pacman is the specialized Arch tool for binary package management (including packages built with the ABS), ABS is a collection of tools for compiling source into installable .pkg.tar.zst packages.

Ports is a system used by *BSD to automate the process of building software from source code. The system uses a port to download, unpack, patch, compile, and install the given software. A port is merely a small directory on the user’s computer, named after the corresponding software to be installed, that contains a few files with the instructions for building and installing the software from source. This makes installing software as simple as typing make or make install clean within the port’s directory.

ABS is a similar concept. A part of ABS is a SVN repository and an equivalent Git repository. The repository contains a directory corresponding to each package available in Arch Linux. The directories of the repository contain a PKGBUILD file (and sometimes other files), and do not contain the software source nor binary. By issuing makepkg inside a directory, the software sources are downloaded, the software is compiled, and then packaged within the build directory. Then you can use pacman to install the package.

Contents

Overview

This article or section needs expansion.

‘ABS’ may be used as an umbrella term since it includes and relies on several other components; therefore, though not technically accurate, ‘ABS’ can refer to the following tools as a complete toolkit:

Repository tree The directory structure containing files needed to build all official packages but not the packages themselves nor the source files of the software. It is available in svn and git repositories. See the section #Repository tree for more information. PKGBUILD A Bash script that contains the URL of the source code along with the compilation and packaging instructions. makepkg A shell command tool which reads the PKGBUILDs, automatically downloads and compiles the sources and creates a .pkg.tar* according to the PKGEXT array in makepkg.conf . You may also use makepkg to make your own custom packages from the AUR or third-party sources. See Creating packages for more information. pacman pacman is completely separate, but is necessarily invoked either by makepkg or manually, to install and remove the built packages and for fetching dependencies. AUR The Arch User Repository is separate from ABS but AUR (unsupported) PKGBUILDs are built using makepkg to compile and package up software. In contrast to the ABS tree which is simply a bare git repository, the AUR exists as a polished website interface with various interactive features. It contains many thousands of user-contributed PKGBUILDs for software which is unavailable as an official Arch package. If you need to build a package outside the official Arch tree, chances are it is in the AUR.

Repository tree

The core, extra, and testing official repositories are in the packages repository for checkout. The community and multilib repositories are in the community repository.

Each package has its own subdirectory. Within it there are repos and trunk directories. repos is further broken down by repository name (e.g., core) and architecture. PKGBUILDs and files found in repos are used in official builds. Files found in trunk are used by developers in preparation before being copied to repos .

For example, the tree for acl looks like this:

The source code for the package is not present in the ABS directory. Instead, the PKGBUILD contains a URL that will download the source code when the package is built.

Use cases

ABS automates certain tasks related to compilation from source. Its use cases are:

• Any use case that requires you to compile or recompile a package.
• Make and install new packages from source of software for which no packages are yet available (see Creating packages) .
• Customize existing packages to fit your needs (e.g. enabling or disabling options, patching).
• Rebuild your entire system using your compiler flags, «à la FreeBSD».
• Cleanly build and install your own custom kernel (see Kernel compilation).
• Get kernel modules working with a custom kernel.
• Easily compile and install a newer, older, beta, or development version of an Arch package by editing the version number in the PKGBUILD.

Usage

Retrieve PKGBUILD source

To retrieve the PKGBUILD required to build a certain package from source, you can either use SVN or a Git-based approach using the asp package which is a thin wrapper around the svntogit repositories. In the following, the svn-based method as well as the git-based method are described.

Retrieve PKGBUILD source using Git

As a precondition, install the asp package. Asp is a tool to retrieve the build source files for Arch Linux packages using the Git interface. Also see the Arch Linux BBS forum thread [1].

To clone the svntogit-repository for a specific package, use:

This will clone the git repository for the given package into a directory named like the package.

To update the cloned git repository, run asp update followed by git pull inside the git repository.

Furthermore, you can use all other git commands to checkout an older version of the package or to track custom changes. For more information on git usage, see the git page.

If you just want to copy a snapshot of the current PKGBUILD for a specific package, use:

Retrieve PKGBUILD source using SVN

Prerequisites

Checkout a repository

To checkout the community and multilib repositories:

In both cases, it simply creates an empty directory, but it does know that it is an svn checkout.

Checkout a package

In the directory containing the svn repository you checked out (i.e., packages or community), do:

This will pull the package you requested into your checkout. From now on, any time you svn update at the top level, this will be updated as well.

If you specify a package that does not exist, svn will not warn you. It will just print something like «At revision 115847», without creating any files. If that happens:

• check your spelling of the package name
• check that the package has not been moved to another repository (i.e. from community to the main repository)
• check https://archlinux.org/packages to see if the package is built from another base package (for example, python-tensorflow is built from the tensorflow PKGBUILD)

You should periodically update all of your checked out packages if you wish to perform rebuilds on more recent revisions of the repositories. To do so, do:

Checkout an older version of a package

Within the svn repository you checked out as described in #Checkout a repository (i.e. «packages» or «community»), first examine the log:

Find out the revision you want by examining the history, then specify the revision you wish to checkout. For example, to checkout revision r1729 you would do:

This will update an existing working copy of package-name to the chosen revision.

You can also specify a date. If no revision on that day exists, svn will grab the most recent package before that time. The following example checks out the revision from 2009-03-03:

It is possible to checkout packages at versions before they were moved to another repository as well; check the logs thoroughly for the date they were moved or the last revision number.

Build package

Configure makepkg for building packages from the PKGBUILDs you have checked out, as explained in makepkg#Configuration.

Then, copy the directory containing the PKGBUILD you wish to modify to a new location. Make the desired modifications there and use makepkg there as described in makepkg#Usage to create and install the new package.

Tips and tricks

Preserve modified packages

Updating the system with pacman will replace a modified package from ABS with the package of the same name from the official repositories. See the following instructions for how to avoid this.

Insert a group array into the PKGBUILD, and add the package to a group called modified .

Add this group to the section IgnoreGroup in /etc/pacman.conf .

If new versions are available in the official repositories during a system update, pacman prints a note that it is skipping this update because it is in the IgnoreGroup section. At this point the modified package should be rebuilt from ABS to avoid partial upgrades.

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