ARCH
How to run Arch Linux on the Pi
Jonni Bidwell installs Arch Linux in less than three days and discovers the best way to browse the web is from the console.
Jonni Bidwell
OUR EXPERT
Jonni Bidwell thinks he can hear the unmistakable sound of a 56K modem in the distance, calling him home
YOU NEED
> Raspberry Pi (any model)
> 4GB or more SD card
> Keyboard
> Mouse
> Monitor
> Wired network
The Raspberry Pi 4, thanks to its faster processor, USB connectivity and networking, is oft-touted as a desktop replacement. Be that as it may, we’re going to show you how even an early model Pi can run a desktop… of sorts. We’re going to use the community ARM port of Arch Linux to set up a lightweight desktop running i3. To add insult to injury, we’ll combine the w3m browser, the mpv media player, and the popular youtube-dl script. This will enable you to browse YouTube (its many adverts and other streaming sites) from the comfort of a terminal window.
Arch Linux is generally recognised as being hard to install, and its ARM counterpart is certainly a far cry from installing Raspberry Pi Linux. However, once we’ve minted our SD card (which we’ll soon see is a bit of a rigmarole), we pretty much have a working system. If you already have Arch installed on your PC, you can follow the second half of the tutorial to join in the console web-browsing fun.