From Parabola GNU/Linux-Libre Wiki

As of the 2012.07.15 installation media release, AIF (the Arch Installation Framework) is no longer included but instead Arch Install Scripts are provided to aid in the installation process. This article summarizes the install process using these scripts. See the Beginners' Guide instead for a walkthrough aimed at new users.

Contents 1 Download 2 Keyboard layout 3 Partition disks 4 Format the partitions 5 Mount the partitions 6 Connect to the Internet 6.1 Wireless 7 Install the base system 8 Install a bootloader 8.1 GRUB 0.97 8.2 GRUB 2 8.3 Syslinux 9 Configure the system 10 Unmount and reboot 11 Configure pacman 12 Update the system 13 Add a user 14 Acknowledgement

Download

Download the new Parabola GNU/Linux-libre ISO from the download page.

• Instead of six different images we only provide a single one which can be booted into an i686 and x86_64 live system to install Parabola GNU/Linux-libre over the network. Media containing the [libre] and [core] repositories are no longer provided.
• Install images are signed and it is highly recommend to verify their signature before use. On Parabola GNU/Linux-libre, this can be done by using

  pacman-key -v <iso-file>.sig

• The image can be burned to a CD, mounted as an ISO file, or directly written to a USB stick using a utility like dd. It is intended for new installations only; an existing Parabola GNU/Linux-libre system can always be updated with pacman -Syu.

Keyboard layout

For many countries and keyboard types appropriate keymaps are available already, and a command like loadkeys uk might do what you want. More available keymap files can be found in /usr/share/kbd/keymaps/ (you can omit the keymap path and file extension when using loadkeys).

Partition disks

See partitioning for details.

Remember to create any stacked block devices like LVM, LUKS, or RAID.

Format the partitions

See File Systems for details.

If you are using (U)EFI you will most probably need another partition to host the UEFI System partition. Read Create an UEFI System Partition in GNU/Linux.

Mount the partitions

We now must mount the root partition on /mnt. You should also create directories for and mount any other partitions (/mnt/boot, /mnt/home, ...) if you want them to be detected by genfstab.

Connect to the Internet

A DHCP service is already enabled for all available devices. If you need to setup a static IP or use management tools such as Netcfg, you should stop this service first: systemctl stop dhcpcd.service. For more information read Configuring Network.

Wireless

Run wifi-menu to set up your wireless network. For details, see Wireless Setup and Netcfg.

Install the base system

Before installing, you may want to edit /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist such that your preferred mirror is first. This copy of the mirrorlist will be installed on your new system by pacstrap as well, so it's worth getting it right.

First update parabola-keyring on the live system unless Issue 223 is fixed for the image you use:

# pacman -Sy parabola-keyring

Install the base system using pacstrap:

# pacstrap /mnt

You can install additional packages passing base and the names of these packages as arguments after the root directory of the new installation (all packages from the base group are installed if no package is specified).

If you have a btrfs root, you probably want to install also btrfs-progs.

Install a bootloader

GRUB 0.97

• Install the grub-legacy package.

• Install GRUB 0.97 after chrooting (refer to the #Configure the system section).

GRUB 2

• For BIOS:

# pacstrap /mnt grub-bios

• For EFI (in rare cases you will need grub-efi-i386 instead):

# pacstrap /mnt grub-efi-x86_64

• Install GRUB 2 after chrooting (refer to the #Configure the system section).

Syslinux

# pacstrap /mnt syslinux

Configure the system

Generate an fstab with the following command (if you prefer to use UUIDs or labels, add the -U or -L option, respectively):

# genfstab -p /mnt >> /mnt/etc/fstab

Next we chroot into our newly installed system:

# arch-chroot /mnt

• Write your hostname to /etc/hostname.
• Symlink /etc/localtime to /usr/share/zoneinfo/Zone/SubZone. Replace Zone and Subzone to your liking. For example:

# ln -s /usr/share/zoneinfo/Europe/Athens /etc/localtime

• Set locale preferences in /etc/locale.conf.
• Add console keymap and font preferences in /etc/vconsole.conf
• Uncomment the selected locale in /etc/locale.gen and generate it with locale-gen.
• Configure /etc/mkinitcpio.conf as needed (see mkinitcpio) and create an initial RAM disk with:

# mkinitcpio -p linux-libre

• To configure the bootloader, you have to install it in the MBR and generate the grub.cfg:

# grub-install /dev/sdX
# grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

• Set a root password with passwd.

Unmount and reboot

If you are still in the chroot environment type exit or press Ctrl+D in order to exit. Earlier we mounted the partitions under /mnt. In this step we will unmount them:

# umount /mnt/{boot,home,}

Now reboot and then login into the new system with the root account.

Configure pacman

Edit /etc/pacman.conf and configure pacman's options, also enabling the repositories you need.

See Pacman and Official Repositories for details.

Update the system

At this point you should update your system.

See Upgrading packages for instructions.

Add a user

Finally, add a normal user as described in User management.

Your new Parabola GNU/Linux-libre base system is now a functional GNU/Linux environment: you can proceed to Beginners' Guide/Extra for customization suggestions.

Acknowledgement