Dotfiles

This repository contains my dotfiles. I usually keep the repository in ~/dotfiles, but it doesn't really matter exactly where. The shell script setup should do everything necessary to symlink dotfiles into place. It will not ask permission, so be careful.

Some highlights, in no particular order:

• Receiving email to a maildir via mbsync, notmuch, afew. Read the mail using emacs/notmuch, mutt, or alot. Or maybe aerc? Idk, whatever supports maildirs.
• Sending mail using msmtp, which makes it easy to use any "sendmail" compatible application, including git send-email forp atches.
• Light mode / dark mode switching which affects terminal apps and KDE apps.
• Copy/paste (mostly) works through vim, tmux, & ssh via the OSC 52.
• Sqlite bash history, command statistics, use fzf to select previous command.
• I still can't get over how good Magit is.

How this repo works

The setup script (actually, libsetup.sh) contains an array called LINKS. LINKS is an array of paths: the corresponding path within $HOME is linked to the file within this repo. For example, if .bashrc is in the array, a symlink will be created such that ~/.bashrc points to the .bashrc in this repo. This will work with paths that contain subdirectories as well.

This is great, unless you need to customize something about the dotfiles based on the environment. For instance, some dotfiles need to be different on Mac vs Linux. For this purpose, we also have M4_LINKS. M4 is a macro utility which is POSIX standard, present on most Linux and Mac machines without any issues. In this case, when .bashrc is in M4_LINKS, the script will first run M4 to create .bashrc from .bashrc.m4, and then do the same symlinking as above.

Notes on my environment

I've maintained these dotfiles for a fairly long time now, and they support some very particular work environments.

• I work mainly in Arch Linux, using KDE Plasma as my desktop environment. I also use Oracle Linux 9 for work, with KDE Plasma there as well.

• I generally use the Alacritty terminal. But I am a huge fan of the drop-down terminal Yakuake as well.

• I use both Emacs and Vim, even if it sounds odd! Emacs is what I might consider my IDE: I use it to integrate with Language Servers (clangd, python-lsp-server, rust-analyzer, etc), and git. I use it when I want to work on a project. Vim is my quick terminal editor. I actually don't want it to be feature rich, beyond decent syntax highlighting. I use it to make quick edits to configuration files, or browse and explore things.

• I prefer to use solarized color schemes. The light is currently what I prefer, but at night it's nice to switch into dark mode.

• My SSH config contains some fairly useful shortcuts for me. There is also a ~/.ssh/local configuration file, which can be used to store things outside version control, if they are especially private or unique to one machine (e.g. my work machine).

Setup

Required Prereqs

Without these this whole exercise would probably be pointless.

• git is pretty required
• bash, tested with >=3.2 on mac
• m4, which ought to be standard on unixy systems

Optional Prereqs

You'll probably want at least some of these tools, because they are kinda why I have my configuration version controlled.

• Email
  • isync for downloading email
  • msmtp for sending email
  • python with the keyring package installed, e.g. python-keyring package
  • git email packages may need to be installed if you intend to send patches out for review
• emacs, ideally the latest with native-comp and tree-sitter.

Install

Simply clone this repo right into ~/.dotfiles, and then run the symlink script. Running the symlink script will clobber anything that preexisted, and it will not ask before doing so. If you're looking to try out parts of my dotfiles, be sure to selectively comment out things that you don't want clobbered.

$ git clone https://github.com/brenns10/dotfiles.git ~/.dotfiles
$ cd ~/.dotfiles
$ ./setup

Post Install

Some things will want to be run for the first time in order to be fully configured, or need a logout/login to take full effect.

• Configure email password as mentioned in optional prereqs
• Emacs will need to run in order to download and install a bunch of packages.
• The ssh-agent won't be running until you log out and back in.

Note on bashrc vs bash_profile

I use the file profile for everything that should happen to set up a login session, and I ensure that it is run whenever I log in via desktop environment, TTY, or SSH.

I use the file bashrc for everything that should happen to set up bash for a shell session in which I will by typing commands manually.

When I run an interactive login shell (e.g. SSH or TTY login), this is run in addition to the profile.

Some examples:

• Log into DE: profile is run (.xprofile is linked to it)
  • Then run interactive shell: bashrc is run. Settings from profile are inherited.
• Log in via TTY: bash_profile is run, which sources profile and then bashrc
• Log in via SSH: bash_profile is run, (similar to above)