I have a basic (command line only) Archlinux installation in place on a partition of my hard drive. I want to add lots of software to this, since I would like this to be my OS for day-to-day activities like word processing, spreadsheets, email, voip, etc . The Archlinux documentation wants you to use pacman to install software. But, I read something that says that pacman syncs your installed software with a server somewhere. "pacman keeps the system up to date by synchronizing package lists with the master server." I don't want my OS configuration synced to the "master server". Nor do I want anybody updating anything in my computer. In my experience, upgrades cause a lot of problems. So how to I install software in Archlinux without going through pacman, or at least keep my OS configuration as private as possible. By the way, I have experimented with apt-get install from the Arch command line, and it does not seem to be included in the base Arch installation.
It keeps a list of the packages available to install synced, not the list packages you have installed, that stays local. Only you control what is updated/upgraded on your machine. No updates can be pushed from the server with any Linux distro I know of.
