Fluxbox on Archlinux [EN]

I went back to my first love when I did my first steps on Linux: Fluxbox.

How comes?

I'm spoiled by Unity, I really like it a lot, but getting it working on Archlinux is - pardon my french - a pain in the ars. I tried multiple times (with or without helper scripts) but the result was far from what I wanted.
Razor-Qt looks promising, but is not there yet. Xfwm looks light-weight, but feels not quite right for me (don't ask, I can't explain it).
Only the Cinnamon installation was going well and I used it almost since my Archlinux installation. But why using a heavy DE which needs ages to load after a bootup of a couple of seconds?
I tried OpenBox, but the whole panel-thing wasn't satisfying (tint2, ADW, Docky, name it!). Then I remembered when I started seriously on Linux, I used Fluxbox on my Slackware installation with great satisfaction.

What's the actual state?

The install itself is as fast as typing pacman -S fluxbox. Now to get it to be as I wish for is another task entirely, but as always: Google is your friend; and when you look closely on the results, the most of them point always back to the Archlinux wiki (way to go, Archlinux community!).

To setup my Fluxbox, first thing I did after the installation was to install and execute arandr for my dual screen layout and copied the resulting shell script content into the Fluxbox startup. After that I let menumaker (mmaker -f Fluxbox) run as well and to update the Fluxbox menu. Furthermore I replaced fbrun (Alt-F2) with gmrun and installed and added to the startup file the gnome notification daemon (I like on-screen messages).

For my media keys on my keyboard - and for pulseaudio - I found a handy ruby script here: https://gist.github.com/1791270 and so I added it to my keys file as well - now I just need to work something out to show the volume level in an on-screen message...

For a clean and lean visual I kept Adwaita from Cinnamon and added the Intuition theme for Fluxbox.

And here's how it looks like:

Arch Linux [EN]

OK, after so many years of eyeing on +Arch Linux I finally did it, I installed it on my workstation!

Preparation

While still running on Ubuntu, I run some installations of Arch Linux in VirtualBox, just to familiarize myself with the process, and I can affirm what everybody else says, the Arch Linux Wiki is a goldmine of information!

And at the same time I  thought about how I prepare my machine for it, what filesystem, bootloader and partition table I want to use as the base for the installation. I searched for articles comparing each and everything until I got all information I needed to make a decision.

Unfortunately one can't (at least to my humble knowledge) simulate a RAID 0 setup in VirtualBox, so this was one unknown factor for the installation process. I had to jump in the cold water :-).

After spending a night with backing up my data locally on an external HDD, I was ready.

Installation

My choices were: GPT, Syslinux and EXT4. Alone to get my workstation to boot into my installation, it took me one day. Because I tried to partition my RAID 0 with the GParted Live CD. I should have done it directly with the Arch Install CD! The installation itself worked like a charm. Thanks again to the wiki!

It was a satisfying moment when my workstation booted finally into Arch Linux.

Customization

Next step was to check everything related to my hardware, all options I can use to speed up my workstation. I fine-tuned the nouveau settings, installed the Cinnamon DE and all necessary software for my work (java, skype, chromium, firefox, etc). Needs a while to get used to Cinnamon though, after so long with Unity. 

It is so much fun to install software with Arch Linux; I still need to get used to do the daily upgrades.

What's next?

Now I need to learn more about the internal working of my system, maybe switch my DE to OpenBox in the near future. The installation was just the first step, the real exploration starts now :-).