On an Arch machine, run: sudo pacman -S arch-install-scripts to have the commands to install the OS into the USB
Make sure USB is NOT mounted and format it
wipefs -a /dev/sdX where X is the assigned letter your USB is mounted on
fdisk /dev/sdX
Disable journaling:
mkfs.ext4 -O "^has_journal" /dev/sdX1
Mount and install arch as usual:
mount /dev/sdfX /mnt
pacstrap /mnt base base-devel grub
genfstab -U /mnt >> /mnt/etc/fstab then change relatime to noatime
arch-chroot /mnt
passwd to change root password
To make persistent:
e2label /dev/sdX1 arch-usb
Add your user with privileges, add hostname and change the hosts file:
useradd -m -g users -G wheel -s /bin/bash user123
echo arch-usb > /etc/hostname
# /etc/hosts
# Static table lookup for hostnames.
# <ip-address> <hostame.domain.org> <hostname>
127.0.0.1 arch-usb.localdomain arch-usb
Locale:
To display the currently set locale and its related environmental settings, type: locale
The locale to be used, chosen among the previously generated ones, is set in locale.conf files. Each of these files must contain a new-line separated list of environment variable assignments, having the same format as output by locale.
To list available locales which have been previously generated, run: localedef --list-archive
Or alternatively, using localectl: localectl list-locales
To set the system locale, write the LANG variable to /etc/locale.conf, where en_US.UTF-8 belongs to the first column of an uncommented entry in /etc/locale.gen:
LANG=en_US.UTF-8
Alternatively, run: localectl set-locale LANG=en_US.UTF-8
General drivers and programs:
pacman -S xf86-video-vesa xf86-video-ati xf86-video-intel xf86-video-nouveau networkmanager network-manager-applet dosfstools ntfs-3g ttf-inconsolata alsa-utils xorg-server xorg-xinit xterm xorg-server-devel strace git firefox
systemctl enable NetworkManager to enable networking
pacman -S lxde a desktop environment
echo exec startlxde > /home/user123/.xinitrc in order to be able to use startx
And to make the DE boot on startup for Bash, add the following to the bottom of ~/.bash_profile, if the file doesn't exist, copy a skeleton version from /etc/skel/.bash_profile or for Zsh, add it to ~/.zprofile
if [[ ! $DISPLAY && $XDG_VTNR -eq 1 ]]; then
exec startx
fi
Install an AUR helper
git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/trizen.git
cd trizen
makepkg -si
Minimizing disk access
You may want to configure journald to store its journals in RAM, e.g. by creating a custom configuration file:
nano /etc/systemd/journald.conf.d/usbstick.conf
[Journal]
Storage=volatile
RuntimeMaxUse=30M
To disable fsync and related system calls in web browsers and other applications that do not write essential data, use the eatmydata command from libeatmydata AUR to avoid such system calls:
eatmydata firefox
Before creating the initial RAM disk with mkinitcpio -p linux, in /etc/mkinitcpio.conf move the block hook to the hooks array right after udev. This is necessary for appropriate module loading in early userspace
mkinitcpio -p linux
grub-install --removable --target=i386-pc /dev/sdX
nano /etc/default/grub on the GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT variable, add elevator=noop to have better I/O performance since we're using the system on a USB
Also you may want to disable Kernel mode setting for various reasons, such as getting a blank screen or a "no signal" error from the display, when using some Intel video cards, etc. To disable KMS, add nomodeset as a kernel parameter on GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT
nano /etc/default/grub
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet nomodeset"
Generate the grub config file with those changes with:
grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg
Now do exit then umount -R /mnt and eject your USB then boot it from a computer
That's it!