Arch Linux Installation - Part Three

Now that the base distribution has been installed we can now continue the installation process by creating an fstab file.

What Is An FStab File

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For a short explaination, an fstab file is basically a text file that holds all of the partitions that we have.

Diving deep into what an fstab file is and does is beyond the scope of this post, but I will put a link below in the additional resources section for those of you who would like to learn more.

Generate The FStab file

To generate our fstab we need to issue the following command:

• genfstab -U -p /mnt >> /mnt/etc/fstab

Setting The Locale

First we need to simulate using our install in a final state before it's finalized in order to make the changes to the locale:

• arch-chroot /mnt

Next, using nano we need to set up the locale that suits our needs:

• nano /etc/locale.gen

Inside the locale.gen file and using the up/down arrow keys to navigate, we need to uncomment the locale we would like to use. Since I'm in the U.S. I will uncomment, meaning deleting the # signs, in front of the following locale:

• en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8

Write down the locale you uncommented because we are going to use it in the next two commands!

Once we've finished making our change hold the control key then press o then press enter to save it then hold the control key again then press x to exit the file.

Now we need to save the locale we just chose. Here is where you will use the locale that you wrote down earlier:

• echo LANG=en_US.UTF-8 > /etc/locale.conf

Ok, so even though we have saved our locale it is still not active yet because we haven't rebooted into the new system yet. So to bypass that we issue the following command:

• export LANG=en_US.UTF-8

Setting The Time Zone

To set the time zone we need to change into the zoneinfo directory:

• cd /usr/share/zoneinfo

To see what zones are in the directory run the following:

• ls

Once again since I'm in America I will change into that directory:

• cd America

Then run ls again to list the time zones in America.

At this point I will select Chicago for my time zone. In order to set it as my time zone I need to create a link by issuing the following commands:

• ln -s /usr/share/zoneinfo/America/Chicago /etc/localtime
• hwclock --systohc --utc

Wrap Up

In the next part we will finish installing Arch!

Additional Resources

• FStab Information

Series Links

• Arch Linux Series - Part One
• Arch Linux Series - Part Two
• Arch Linux Series - Part Four
• Arch Linux Series - Part Five