Ask HN: What do you use to manage dotfiles?

#1

Post by polm23 » Wed, Feb 10, 2016, 4:39 AM UTC

No post body was provided.

Re: Ask HN: What do you use to manage dotfiles?

#2

Post by celadevra_ » Wed, Feb 10, 2016, 5:45 AM UTC

Emacs Org-mode's org-babel functionality. I have a few org-mode files storing all the dotfiles, put under version control. I can update and deploy them from within Emacs.

Re: Ask HN: What do you use to manage dotfiles?

#3

Post by Kototama » Wed, Feb 10, 2016, 10:17 AM UTC

Git. Look for "homegit" on this page: http://chneukirchen.org/blog/archive/2013/01/a-grab-bag-of-g...

Re: Ask HN: What do you use to manage dotfiles?

#4

Post by mintplant » Wed, Feb 10, 2016, 10:21 AM UTC

GNU stow and git, per this tutorial:

http://brandon.invergo.net/news/2012-05-26-using-gnu-stow-to...

Re: Ask HN: What do you use to manage dotfiles?

#5

Post by charlieegan3 » Wed, Feb 10, 2016, 10:23 AM UTC

I have a GitHub repo with a script that sets everything up. https://github.com/charlieegan3/dotfiles

Seems to be quite a common pattern: https://github.com/search?o=desc&q=dotfiles&s=stars&type=Rep...

Re: Ask HN: What do you use to manage dotfiles?

#6

Post by gtf21 » Wed, Feb 10, 2016, 10:25 AM UTC

git + symlinks (https://github.com/gfarrell/dotfiles). I use a makefile to set everything up

Re: Ask HN: What do you use to manage dotfiles?

#7

Post by jamescun » Wed, Feb 10, 2016, 10:25 AM UTC

I see a trend of people maintaining a GitHub repo called `dotfiles` for their public configurations, myself included for zsh/tmux/vim/git. I haven't found a satisfactory way to sync secrets between machines other than via sneakernet.

https://github.com/jamescun/dotfiles

Re: Ask HN: What do you use to manage dotfiles?

#8

Post by StreakyCobra » Wed, Feb 10, 2016, 10:27 AM UTC

I use:

    git init --bare $HOME/.myconf
    alias config='/usr/bin/git --git-dir=$HOME/.myconf/ --work-tree=$HOME'
    config config status.showUntrackedFiles no

where my ~/.myconf directory is a git bare repository. Then any file within the home folder can be versioned with normal commands like:

    config status
    config add .vimrc
    config commit -m "Add vimrc"
    config add .config/redshift.conf
    config commit -m "Add redshift config"
    config push

And so one…

No extra tooling, no symlinks, files are tracked on a version control system, you can use different branches for different computers, you can replicate you configuration easily on new installation.

Re: Ask HN: What do you use to manage dotfiles?

#9

Post by Fizzadar » Wed, Feb 10, 2016, 10:30 AM UTC

Git! https://github.com/Fizzadar/dotfiles

Re: Ask HN: What do you use to manage dotfiles?

#10

Post by rjbwork » Wed, Feb 10, 2016, 10:31 AM UTC

jamescun wrote: post #7

I see a trend of people maintaining a GitHub repo called `dotfiles` for their public configurations, myself included for zsh/tmux/vim/git. I haven't found a satisfactory way to sync secrets between machines other than via sneakernet. https://github.com/jamescun/dotfiles

Have you tried syncthing perchance?