6 ms·

I was wondering "why" and then started scrolling down and the GUI around pamac and AUR is compelling, because AUR is THE best thing about Arch. I install 99%+ o

I was wondering "why" and then started scrolling down and the GUI around pamac and AUR is compelling, because AUR is THE best thing about Arch. I install 99%+ of my packages with an AUR helper (yay) because AUR is so well contributed too! The BTRFS by default seems compelling too!

The_rationalist 6y ago
What does this gui bring over the one in manjaro?
- Quot 6y ago
  Pamac is the default GUI package manager for Manjaro, so there's nothing different with that.
globular-toast 6y ago
I thought the appeal of Arch was that it's a bit like Gentoo without all the compiling? Why not use Gentoo if 99% of your stuff is AUR builds?
- fao_ 6y ago
  The last time I tried to install gentoo the build system itself broke mid-install
  - globular-toast 6y ago
    Odd. Used it for years and it's never let me down. It's way more stable than Arch which will definitely break if you're not careful as everything is bleeding edge.
    - fao_ 6y ago
      I've used arch for about 9 years and have only really had it break on me for a reason that was a) shitty hardware or b) a pre-planned breakage that was alerted to and a solution given via the news page. Maybe some other minor cases of breakage but all had solutions in say, the Arch Wiki. Never has the build system itself crapped out on me, though
- bachmeier 6y ago
  AUR is separate from the main repositories. I don't think I ever compiled a package that was in the main repos. With Gentoo, you compile it all.
  - globular-toast 6y ago
    I understand that, but the comment I replied to said he uses 95% AUR.
- majormjr 6y ago
  Many AUR packages have a binary package available for install.
hnarn 6y ago
> BTRFS by default seems compelling I must have missed something, because every person I've ever heard talk about BTRFS has said something along the lines of "I would never use that in production". Is that view of BTRFS outdated? Last time I used it for example, I tried out compression only to realize that there's actually no command to see what compression ratio is being applied without installing what I interpreted as a third party tool (compsize).
- m463 6y ago
  I started wondering about BTRFS when I read this: One thing I will not run is btrfs, aka ENOSPCfs. I saw it fail again, and again, and again, and again, AND AGAIN, and again, and again. Then I saw it fail some more. The promised features never materialized, and the drama and surprising behaviors never ceased. All costs, no benefits? I'll leave that on the shelf, a few spots down from reiserfs (which was plenty sketchy BEFORE you know who did you know what). https://rachelbythebay.com/w/2020/12/11/feedback/ https://rachelbythebay.com/w/2020/12/11/feedback/
- jeroenhd 6y ago
  I've used BTRFS on my laptop for a while and it was working fine. In my use case, however, I ran into trouble because I was constantly near the edge of filling the file system so I very often needed to do rebalancing and other tricks to claim more free space. It was a bother, but it beat spending $150 I didn't have on a 512GB SSD at the time. For modern systems with normal use cases (i.e. not mine back then), I don't foresee a lot trouble. I went with encrypted ext4 because that was included in the installer during my reinstall, but I wouldn't change the settings if the installer had defaulted to BTRFS. There's a lot more tooling out there for debugging ext4, but honestly, I never really missed anything when I still used BTRFS. The lack of tools makes data recovery harder in case of a complete failure (always make backups, no matter what file system!) so I wouldn't use it in a production server, but for a desktop or laptop OS I don't really see the problem. Using Timeshift for snapshot management as a way to sort-of emulate Windows' system restore is kind of neat and got me interested in trying it out again next time I'm reinstalling Linux. Last time I didn't have the space for snapshots, but now I do and it solves a problem I've had before (quick and easy backups after modifying system config) with ext4-based installs.

The_rationalist 6y ago

What does this gui bring over the one in manjaro?

Quot 6y ago
Pamac is the default GUI package manager for Manjaro, so there's nothing different with that.

globular-toast 6y ago

I thought the appeal of Arch was that it's a bit like Gentoo without all the compiling? Why not use Gentoo if 99% of your stuff is AUR builds?

fao_ 6y ago
The last time I tried to install gentoo the build system itself broke mid-install
- globular-toast 6y ago
  Odd. Used it for years and it's never let me down. It's way more stable than Arch which will definitely break if you're not careful as everything is bleeding edge.
  - fao_ 6y ago
    I've used arch for about 9 years and have only really had it break on me for a reason that was a) shitty hardware or b) a pre-planned breakage that was alerted to and a solution given via the news page. Maybe some other minor cases of breakage but all had solutions in say, the Arch Wiki. Never has the build system itself crapped out on me, though
bachmeier 6y ago
AUR is separate from the main repositories. I don't think I ever compiled a package that was in the main repos. With Gentoo, you compile it all.
- globular-toast 6y ago
  I understand that, but the comment I replied to said he uses 95% AUR.
majormjr 6y ago
Many AUR packages have a binary package available for install.

hnarn 6y ago

> BTRFS by default seems compelling I must have missed something, because every person I've ever heard talk about BTRFS has said something along the lines of "I would never use that in production". Is that view of BTRFS outdated? Last time I used it for example, I tried out compression only to realize that there's actually no command to see what compression ratio is being applied without installing what I interpreted as a third party tool (compsize).

m463 6y ago
I started wondering about BTRFS when I read this: One thing I will not run is btrfs, aka ENOSPCfs. I saw it fail again, and again, and again, and again, AND AGAIN, and again, and again. Then I saw it fail some more. The promised features never materialized, and the drama and surprising behaviors never ceased. All costs, no benefits? I'll leave that on the shelf, a few spots down from reiserfs (which was plenty sketchy BEFORE you know who did you know what). https://rachelbythebay.com/w/2020/12/11/feedback/ https://rachelbythebay.com/w/2020/12/11/feedback/
jeroenhd 6y ago
I've used BTRFS on my laptop for a while and it was working fine. In my use case, however, I ran into trouble because I was constantly near the edge of filling the file system so I very often needed to do rebalancing and other tricks to claim more free space. It was a bother, but it beat spending $150 I didn't have on a 512GB SSD at the time. For modern systems with normal use cases (i.e. not mine back then), I don't foresee a lot trouble. I went with encrypted ext4 because that was included in the installer during my reinstall, but I wouldn't change the settings if the installer had defaulted to BTRFS. There's a lot more tooling out there for debugging ext4, but honestly, I never really missed anything when I still used BTRFS. The lack of tools makes data recovery harder in case of a complete failure (always make backups, no matter what file system!) so I wouldn't use it in a production server, but for a desktop or laptop OS I don't really see the problem. Using Timeshift for snapshot management as a way to sort-of emulate Windows' system restore is kind of neat and got me interested in trying it out again next time I'm reinstalling Linux. Last time I didn't have the space for snapshots, but now I do and it solves a problem I've had before (quick and easy backups after modifying system config) with ext4-based installs.