Disk Configuration

There are only three modes in the disk_config option. They are described in more detail below.

“Leave as is”

{
    "config_type": "pre_mounted_config",
    "mountpoint": "/mnt/archinstall"
}

This mode will not perform any partitioning what so ever. Instead it relies on what’s mounted manually by the user under /mnt/archinstall.

Given the following disk example:

/mnt/archinstall    (/dev/sda2)
     ├── boot       (/dev/sda1)
     └── home       (/dev/sda3)

Running archinstall --conf your.json --silent where the above JSON is configured. The disk will be left alone — and a working system will be installed to the above folders and mountpoints will be translated into the installed system.

Note

Some disk layouts can be too complicated to detect, such as RAID setups. Please do report those setups on the Issue Tracker so we can support them.

Best Effort

Warning

This mode will wipe data!

Note

Note that this options is similar to the manual partitioning but is generated through the menu system! And the best effort layout might deviate slightly from some wiki guidelines in order to facilitate some optional configurations at a later stage.

{
    "disk_config": {
        "config_type": "default_layout",
        "device_modifications": [
            {
                "device": "/dev/sda",
                "wipe": true,
                "partitions": "..."
            }
        ]
    }
}

This mode will attempt to configure a sane default layout on the selected disks. Based on the chosen filesystem, and potential optional settings for said filesystem — different default layouts will be provided.

Manual Partitioning

{
     "disk_config": {
         "config_type": "manual_partitioning",
         "device_modifications": [
            "filesystem struct"
         ]
     }
 }

Manual partitioning is the most complex one of the three. It offers you near endless flexibility of how to partition your disk. It integrates against pyparted and some control logic in archinstall that deals with creating things like subvolumes and compression.

Sizes are by default sector units, but other units are supported.

The options supplied to manual_partitioning are dictionary definitions, where the following parameters must exist:

JSON options

Key	Value(s)	Description	Required
device	str	Which block-device to format	yes
partitions	[ {key: val} ]	The data describing the change/addition in a partition	yes
wipe	bool	clear the disk before adding any partitions	No

Each partition definition heavily relies on what filesystem is used. Below follow two of the more common filesystems, anything else will best be described by running archinstall to generate a desired configuration for the desired filesystem type — and copy the relevant parts for permanent configurations.

Warning

Important to note that the units and positions in the examples below — are highly user specific!

FAT32

{
        "btrfs": [],
        "flags": [
           "boot"
        ],
        "fs_type": "fat32",
        "length": {
           "sector_size": null,
           "total_size": null,
           "unit": "B",
           "value": 99982592
        },
        "mount_options": [],
        "mountpoint": "/boot",
        "obj_id": "369f31a8-2781-4d6b-96e7-75680552b7c9",
        "start": {
           "sector_size": {
               "sector_size": null,
               "total_size": null,
               "unit": "B",
               "value": 512
           },
           "total_size": null,
           "unit": "sectors",
           "value": 34
        },
        "status": "create",
        "type": "primary"
}

Note

The Boot flag will make archinstall automatically set the correct ESP partition GUID if the system is booted with EFI support. The GUID will then be set to C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B.

EXT4

     {
   "btrfs": [],
   "flags": [],
   "fs_type": "ext4",
   "length": {
      "sector_size": null,
      "total_size": null,
      "unit": "B",
      "value": 15805127360
   },
   "mount_options": [],
   "mountpoint": "/",
   "obj_id": "3e75d045-21a4-429d-897e-8ec19a006e8b",
   "start": {
      "sector_size": {
         "sector_size": null,
         "total_size": null,
         "unit": "B",
         "value": 512
      },
      "total_size": {
         "sector_size": null,
         "total_size": null,
         "unit": "B",
         "value": 16106127360
      },
      "unit": "MB",
      "value": 301
   },
   "status": "create",
   "type": "primary"
}

BTRFS

The BTRFS filesystem is inherently more complicated, thus the options are a bit more involved. This example contains both subvolumes and compression.

Note

Note that the "mountpoint": null is used for the overall partition, and instead individual subvolumes have mountpoints set.

{
   "btrfs": [
       {
           "mountpoint": "/",
           "name": "@",
       },
       {
           "mountpoint": "/home",
           "name": "@home",
       },
       {
           "mountpoint": "/var/log",
           "name": "@log",
       },
       {
           "mountpoint": "/var/cache/pacman/pkg",
           "name": "@pkg",
       },
       {
           "mountpoint": "/.snapshots",
           "name": "@.snapshots",
       }
   ],
   "dev_path": null,
   "flags": [],
   "fs_type": "btrfs",
   "mount_options": [
       "compress=zstd"
   ],
   "mountpoint": null,
   "obj_id": "d712357f-97cc-40f8-a095-24ff244d4539",
   "size": {
       "sector_size": {
           "unit": "B",
           "value": 512
       },
       "unit": "B",
       "value": 15568207872
   },
   "start": {
       "sector_size": {
           "unit": "B",
           "value": 512
       },
       "unit": "MiB",
       "value": 513
   },
   "status": "create",
   "type": "primary"
}