How to Install Deepin Desktop Environment in Arch Linux

In this article, we install deepin desktop environment in arch linux and we know little bit about linux and desktop environment.

Install deepin desktop environment in arch linux
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Linux is all about what you want and having it free and open source software. The Linux world is full of open source software. You have the option of choosing from hundreds of distributions and customize them as per your choice. No one touch you with a copyright even if you change the source code of a distro to your Linux distro and release it with a new name. That’s the beauty of free software and open source. Only one thing the creators may ask you is to give them proper credits because they have also invested their efforts and time.

Now let’s talk about desktop environment.  A desktop environment or graphical desktop is a set of essential tools and utilities running on top of your operating system. Desktop environment consist of different applications and a GUI via which the user interacts with the operating system. Desktop environment also make your desktop more attractive. Just like a Deepin, there are many different desktop environment like KED, Gnome, Xfce, etc.

About Deepin desktop environment (DDE)

Deepin desktop is a lightweight, elegant desktop environment. It was originally created for Linux Deepin distribution. Now, DDE will support most Linux operating systems such as Arch Linux, Ubuntu, Fedora, openSUSE etc.

How to Install Deepin Desktop Environment in Arch Linux

Make sure your Arch Linux distribution is up-to-date. To install deepin desktop environment in arch linux

To update Arch Linux distro, run the following command as root user from Terminal:

#pacman -Syu

Once the system is updated, reboot it to apply the changes.

Now, we need to install xorg (X Window System) that provides graphical environment.

#sudo pacman -S xorg xorg-server

Press ENTER to install all packages that needed for X Window environment.

Once our X Window System is installed, finally, run the following command to install Deepin desktop environment.

#sudo pacman -S deepin

Now, this will show the list of software programs to be installed in your Arch Linux. Just press ENTER to install all packages.

After installing the basic package to get the desktop working, and enabling networking, there are still a few things left to install. The “deepin-extra” meta-package. This will give the desktop environment added utilities, and tools that make using the desktop environment a complete experience.

To do, so run:

#sudo pacman -S deepin-extra

That’s it. Deepin DE and Deepin extras have been installed. Let us go ahead and configure the display manager.

Configure and Install Deepin DE display manager

Deepin DE uses lightdm display manager (login manager). A “greeter” is what the user sees when they log in on the system. It’s the core component of LightDM, and without a greeter, LightDM won’t even turn on. To enable this greeter, first install LightDM with:

#sudo pacman -S lightdm

After installing the package, the LightDM login manager won’t work, as configuration is needed with systemd. Enable it as the default DM with:

#sudo systemctl enable lightdm -f

To use DDE’s lightdm greeter, you must edit light configuration file. To do so, Edit:

sudo nano /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf

Find the following line:

#greeter-session=example-gtk-gnome

And, uncomment and change it as shown below.

greeter-session=lightdm-deepin-greeter

Save the updated configuration file with Ctrl + O.

Then, start and enable lightdm login manager to start at boot as shown below.

#systemctl start lightdm.service
#systemctl enable lightdm.service

Then use the test command to make sure everything checks out.

#lightdm --test-mode --debug

WARNING! Do not reboot if the debug test results are not successful! If this happens, your configuration is wrong. Follow the above steps and do it again! When the debug command passes, reboot.

Here is the link to  install Yaourt to install packages on Arch Linux and install java jdk on Arch Linux.

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