.cfg

Configuration .dotfiles

Starting from scratch

If you haven't been tracking your configurations in a Git repository before, you can start using this technique easily with these lines:

git init --bare $HOME/.cfg
alias cfg='/usr/bin/git --git-dir=$HOME/.cfg/ --work-tree=$HOME'
cfg config --local status.showUntrackedFiles no
echo "alias cfg='/usr/bin/git --git-dir=$HOME/.cfg/ --work-tree=$HOME'" >> $HOME/.zshrc

• The first line creates a folder ~/.cfg which is a Git bare repository that will track our files.
• Then we create an alias cfg which we will use instead of the regular git when we want to interact with our configuration repository.
• We set a flag - local to the repository - to hide files we are not explicitly tracking yet. This is so that when you type cfg status and other commands later, files you are not interested in tracking will not show up as untracked.
• Also you can add the alias definition by hand to your .zshrc or use the the fourth line provided for convenience.

After you've executed the setup any file within the $HOME folder can be versioned with normal commands, replacing git with your newly created cfg alias, like:

cfg status
cfg add .vimrc
cfg commit -m "Add vimrc"
cfg add .zshrc
cfg commit -m "Add zshrc"
cfg push

Install your dotfiles onto a new system (or migrate to this setup)

ProTip 🔥: Use a script like mine to setup new system automatically (and skip all remaining steps):

curl -s https://cdn.imranc.io/static/cfg/clone | bash

If you already store your configuration/dotfiles in a Git repository, on a new system you can migrate to this setup with the following steps:

• Prior to the installation make sure you have committed the alias to your .zsh:

alias cfg='/usr/bin/git --git-dir=$HOME/.cfg/ --work-tree=$HOME'

• And that your source repository ignores the folder where you'll clone it, so that you don't create weird recursion problems:

echo ".cfg" >> .gitignore

• Now clone your dotfiles into a bare repository in a "dot" folder of your $HOME:

git clone --bare https://github.com/imrancio/.cfg.git $HOME/.cfg
# or git clone --bare git@github.com:imrancio/.cfg.git $HOME/.cfg

• Define the alias in the current shell scope:

alias cfg='/usr/bin/git --git-dir=$HOME/.cfg/ --work-tree=$HOME'

• Checkout the actual content from the bare repository to your $HOME:

cfg checkout

• The step above might fail with a message like:

error: The following untracked working tree files would be overwritten by checkout:
    .zshrc
    .gitignore
Please move or remove them before you can switch branches.
Aborting

This is because your $HOME folder might already have some stock configuration files which would be overwritten by Git. The solution is simple: back up the files if you care about them, remove them if you don't care. I provide you with a possible rough shortcut to move all the offending files automatically to a backup folder:

mkdir -p .cfg-backup && \
cfg checkout 2>&1 | egrep "\s+\." | awk {'print $1'} | \
xargs -I{} mv {} .cfg-backup/{}

• Re-run the check out if you had problems:

cfg checkout

• Set the flag showUntrackedFiles to no on this specific (local) repository:

cfg config --local status.showUntrackedFiles no

• You're done, from now on you can now type cfg commands to add and update your dotfiles:

cfg status
cfg add .vimrc
cfg commit -m "Add vimrc"
cfg add .bashrc
cfg commit -m "Add bashrc"
cfg push

Install zsh config only

If you only want to install my zsh config without any of my other config files, run the following helper script:

curl -s https://cdn.imranc.io/static/zsh/init | bash