How to build and install perl packages on archlinux

The best way to install a perl package is using the distros package manager.
This makes it easy to later remove a perl package and avoid conflicts.

Install the arch package: perl-cpanplus-dist-arch
Execute: setupdistarch
cpanp -i PERL::PACK

cpanp is now configured to build arch linux packages instead of using the "normal" perl way. It even builds and installs all dependencies if you configured it correctly in the "Execute: setupdistarch"  step.

That's it.

How to move your linux (archlinux) installation to a new hdd

There are several methods to do this. This method simply copies all files from HDDold to HDDnew, reinstalles the bootloader and that it.

1. Boot a livecd (archlinux install iso will do ("loadkeys de" to 
     switch keyboard layout))
2. mount /dev/sdOLD /mnt/old (ex. /dev/sda1) (fdisk -l)
3. mount /dev/sdNEW /mnt/new (ex. /dev/sdb1)
4. cp -rav /mnt/old/* /mnt/new
4.1 Or you can use rsync: rsync -avH /mnt/old/ /mnt/new/
    rsync can exclude directories:
    rsync -avH --exclude '/mnt/old/home/porn' /mnt/old/ /mnt/new/
5. umount /mnt/old

Thats it for now, all files are on our new disk.
(If you are on archlinux and use syslinux as your bootloader of choice you can skip 6.1 - 6.5)

We now have to chroot into our new copy to be able to install grub.

6.1. mount -o bind /dev /mnt/new/dev
6.2. mount -t proc none /mnt/new/proc
6.3. chroot /mnt/new /bin/bash

Grub installation:

6.4. grub-install /dev/sdNEW
6.5. exit

Syslinux installation:
(make sure you are not in a chroot environment. The archlinux syslinux script supports installing syslinux in a mounted linux environment.)

7.1.  syslinux-install_update -a -i -m -c /mnt/new

Thats it, we are done.

8. Exit and reboot

Make sure to remove your old harddrive and put the new one to the same SATA port, so it will get the same device name in linux.

Extended bash tab completion

Just install the package "bash-completion" in archlinux und you will get extended tab completion for the following programs: http://wklej.org/id/808581

*edit: Make sure  "/etc/bash.bashrc" is up-to-date otherwise it may not work.

Even tab completion for rsync and scp remote files structures works now.

More speed (responsiveness) for the linux desktop

Ram and file system cache:

vm.swappiness=20
vm.vfs_cache_pressure=50
more info

Preload most used applications/libs:

preload 
more info

Mounting /tmp to RAM

add this to your fstab:

tmpfs /tmp tmpfs defaults,noatime,nodev,nosuid,mode=1777 0 0

more info

BFS Kernel

There is a set of kernel patches that increases the responsiveness of the linux desktop. This is not limited to archlinux btw.

There are two main ways to get it on archlinux:
Build it from AUR: yaourt -S linux-ck

Or us a repository with precompiled packages:

[repo-ck]
Server = http://repo-ck.com/$arch

more info

speed up your archlinux system

Found this post with some tips to optimize your archlinux system:
http://tuxtraining.com/2009/09/04/optimize-pacman-and-free-space-on-arch

In short:

pacman -Sc This clears outdated/uninstalled packages.

pacman -Scc This clears the whole folder, not just the packages that are outdated/uninstalled.

pacman-optimize && sync optimizing the archlinux database