What is the difference between /mnt/boot and /boot
I’m installing Arch Linux and going by the instructions I want to mount the EFI partition at /boot, however I see on the internet people using both /boot and /mnt/boot and I have no idea what the difference is, if any.
If you are installing Arch, follow the installation guide to the letter. Do not change anything. And don’t follow any other guides, don’t go to any random YouTube videos or anything, just use the official Arch docs. They are excellent. Once you have installed, you can always make adjustments, but the best way to screw up an Arch install is to deviate in any way from the guide.
Now, while installing Arch, what you do is boot into a simple live system and then you set up the partitions for the actual installation. While in this live system, you are expected to mount everything under /mnt, but that’s only while preparing. When you actually boot into your installed system, those things will be mounted in the normal locations.
So while installing, your / is mounted to /mnt and that’s why /boot is mounted to /mnt/boot. You will see that in a subsequent step, you are asked to run arch-chroot /mnt which mimics having booted into the system whose / is /mnt. But all this is just for setting up. Once you are done, you will reboot and your / will be / and /boot will be /boot and not /mnt/boot.