How do you manage your dotfiles?

Originally Posted by JZL240I-U Log in and click on "Tread Tools". That should do it.

Hi JZL240I-U. I'm obviously logged in already, since I posted the previous comment. The Thread Tools feature for other threads that I've made show the mark as solved option. But the option is not there for this thread.

Originally Posted by linustalman I don't see any option to mark this thread as solved.

Only the original poster can mark a thread as Solved.
As you're not that OP, the option isn't there for you.

Originally Posted by ehartman Only the original poster can mark a thread as Solved. As you're not that OP, the option isn't there for you.

Hi ehartman, thanks. My bad. I was sure that I had begun this thread - I might be getting it mixed up with another similar thread that I started a while back. 🤦

Originally Posted by linustalman I was sure that I had begun this thread - I might be getting it mixed up with another similar thread that I started a while back. 🤦

This thread essentially is a poll, started by Jeremy (the Forum owner) himself. See message #1 in the thread.

Originally Posted by jeremy The official LQ poll series continues. This time we want to know: How do you manage your dotfiles?

I essentially do not: I backup the whole partition every month and my home dir (selectively) every once in a while, when I think too much has changed.

tar and rsync backup hidden files just fine, but restoring after a disaster can be a lot of work. I actually created a directory with symbolic links to my .emacs, .bashrc, .ssh/ and other files that would be life-changing if I lost. It makes recovery one step simpler to have that set of immediately needed files handy.

That's why I'm going to start using Ansible!

I copy all dotfiles to a separate directory and rename them with the dot removed. This is easier for me to see the one I want to restore from a backup of that directory.

git-subrepo and stow.

This combination deprecates things like the plugin managers/frameworks for ZSH and vim.

Originally Posted by dugan git-subrepo and stow.

Are you using GNU Stow in the manner described by Brandon Invergo, (as per Stow homepage) or a different method?

I'm not sure I understand what specifically git-subrepo does and how it helps - the combination seems more complicated than just using Git's built-in functionality for splitting repo and working dir (as described by Nicola Paolucci of Atlassian)...?

My dot files get backed up along with everything else in my home directory.

--glenn

Originally Posted by boughtonp Are you using GNU Stow in the manner described by Brandon Invergo, (as per Stow homepage) or a different method? I'm not sure I understand what specifically git-subrepo does and how it helps - the combination seems more complicated than just using Git's built-in functionality for splitting repo and working dir (as described by Nicola Paolucci of Atlassian)...?

Well, my dotfiles are here:

https://github.com/duganchen/dotfiles

I, for example, use zsh-syntax-highlighting.

I clone it with git-subrepo to subrepos/zsh-syntax-highlighting:

git subrepo clone git@github.com:zsh-users/zsh-syntax-highlighting.git subrepos/zsh-syntax-highlighting

I'm going to actually want zsh-syntax-highlighting installed to ~/.zsh, so, in the root of the dotfiles repo, I do this:

mkdir -p cfg/.zsh
cd cfg/.zsh
ln -s ../../subrepos/zsh-syntax-highlighting

Yes, it's a relative symlink, but stow will be smart enough to deal with that when I use it. Anyway, I need to source it in ~/.zshrc, so I put the following in cfg/.zshrc:

source ~/.zsh/zsh-syntax-highlighting/zsh-syntax-highlighting.zsh

And then, in the root of the repo, I install the contents of the cfg directory with GNU stow:

stow -t ~ cfg

That creates the ~/.zshrc and ~/.zsh/zsh-syntax-highlighting/ symbolic links, which point to the corresponding locations in the repo's cfg/ directory.

By now, nearly all programs should place configuration files in $XDG_CONFIG_HOME (default ~/.config) rather than in dotfiles in the home directory. I switched all of my programs years ago.
Ed

Originally Posted by dugan Well, my dotfiles are here...

Thanks, I get it now. You have dotfiles as a repo, but also multiple repos within dotfiles/subrepos which git-subrepo helps you to manage, without resorting to submodules (which are a PITA).

Originally Posted by EdGr By now, nearly all programs should place configuration files in $XDG_CONFIG_HOME (default ~/.config) rather than in dotfiles in the home directory. I switched all of my programs years ago.

There's a large list of software that still doesn't use it: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/XDG_Base_Directory#Hardcoded

Many of those could easily add the functionality, but refuse with flimsy and disingenuous excuses.