This year marked 18 years since the first official release of Arch Linux. Now that the distribution has reached adulthood, it is a good time to reflect on its history, the decisions that have made it the distribution it is today, and what lessons we have learned along the way. We will conclude with a discussion of the future of the distribution, what we are currently working towards and the possibilities to come.

The pacman package manager is one of the major distinguishing features of Arch Linux. It combines a simple binary package format with an easy-to-use build system. While pacman does not strive to do everything (and is very nearly perfect), there are still some ideas for future improvements and additions. This talk will explore some of the possible futures of package management.