Dotfiles

This is only public so I can easily share it across machines. There is probably nothing of interest for you here ... or is there?

My usage is mostly terminal-based, via Crostini on Chromebook, WSL2 on Windows, and (rarely) MacOS terminal. Making heavy use of:

• Bash / Tmux
• FZF / pistol / fd / ripgrep
• Neovim
• cmus

Graphical sections are Linux-only, and use:

• sway / swaync / waybar
• WezTerm
• Firefox

On MacOS, use:

• WezTerm
• Rectangle

Letting me own your machine

git clone https://github.com/fortes/dotfiles.git --branch debian-bookworm
./dotfiles/scripts/setup_machine

Setup

Once you've run setup, you'll still have to do the following manual steps:

1. Generate this machine's SSH keys:

   ssh-keygen -t ed25519 -C "$(hostname)"

   Then add the key into GitHub and wherever else

2. Add any additional ssh keys into ~/.ssh

   Might need to extract out of 1Password, once downloaded will have the password removed. To restore, do

   ssh-keygen -p -f KEY_FILE

   Alternatively, try using the command line op to get the keys:

   op item get SSH_KEY_ITEM_ID --fields "private key" --reveal > ~/.ssh/xxx &&
   op item get SSH_KEY_ITEM_ID --fields "public key" > ~/.ssh/xxx.pub
   # Private key has quotes around it, so need to remove them before this next step
   ssh-keygen -p -f ~/.ssh/xxx
   chmod 400 ~/.ssh/xxx*

3. Authorize your public keys on the new machine:

   ssh-import-id gh:fortes

4. Add your favorite servers into .ssh/config.local

5. Setup .gitconfig.local:

   [user]
     name = Your Name
     email = xyz@abc.com
   

   If you need to tweak any config based upon the directory path, do something like

   [includeIf "gitdir:~/src/company/"]
     path = ~/.config/git/company.gitconfig
   

Ignoring changes to a file

git update-index --skip-worktree ./symlinks/npmrc

To make changes in the future:

git update-index --no-skip-worktree ./symlinks/npmrc

Additional Settings

TODO: Automate these steps.

• (Optional) Enable GitHub copilot via ~/.profile.local, then run :Copilot setup in NeoVim to authenticate
• Install kindlegen from Amazon (TODO: See if possible to script this)

Firefox / Chrome

• Log into sync accounts, extensions should automatically install
• Configure uBlock
  • Enable in private mode
  • Enable cloud storage mode. Should do the following, but doesn't always work:
    • Enable annoyances filters
    • Add Bypass paywalls clean filter

Debian

• Run browser setup above

• Can install some optional apps via scripts:

  • dotfiles/scripts/setup_kvm
  • dotfiles/scripts/setup_signal
  • dotfiles/scripts/setup_zerotier
  • dotfiles/scripts/setup_zoom

• Depending on the machine, you may need pavucontrol in order to unmute your audio output via GUI. ** Alternatively, find the name of the desired output via pacmd list-sinks then run pacmd set-default-sink $SINK_NAME and make sure to unmute via pacmd set-sink-mute [name] 0

• If running multiple monitors, need to configure Wacom tablet to only use a specific monitor:

  input "type:tablet_tool" {
    map_to_output DP-1 
  }
  

• For High DPI displays, create a ~/.Xresources.local file with the proper Xft.dpi (see .Xresources for example)

• To mount SMB shares on boot, add something like the following to /etc/fstab:

  //machine-name/share /media/share cifs nofail,user=,password=,ro	0	0
  

Docker

• Must start Neovim in order to install plugin manager

Bookworm Upgrade

The Bullseye to Bookworm upgrade requires a few manual steps that I'm too lazy to automate:

• Must call apt-key delete on keys for et, signal, etc repos that were added via the now deprecated apt-key. Find the key id by taking the last eight digits of the hex displayed (no space). E.g. apt-key del 57F6FB06 for Signal. Need to then delete the relevant fiels in /etc/apt/sources.list.d as well
• pip user packages no longer work, everything got moved to pipx/venv and there may be some strays left in ~/.local/bin that need to be manually removed
  • pip freeze --user | xargs pip uninstall should work here
• Remove /etc/apt/sources.list.d/bullseye-backports.list and let the script add the new one

Chromebook

• Do setup via phone, should copy over everything
• Set local device password and PIN for quicker local login
• Extensions, settings, and play store apps should automatically sync
  • Night light might need to be manually set up?
• Chrome Extension Setup
  • 1Password: Login to account
  • uBlock Origin: Need to enable cloud sync and copy over settings
• Enable Linux, choose a larger disk size (20GB fine?). Double check which debian version it is via lsb_release -a (should be bookworm)
• Run setup_machine
• Share Downloads folder with Linux, then symlink via ln -s /mnt/chromeos/MyFiles/Downloads ~/downloads

Windows

• Run all Windows Updates
• Install drivers, update BIOS, etc
• Uninstall Teams, and other pre-installed unwanted things
• Enable BitLocker
• Adjust taskbar settings
• Disable browser tabs from being in Alt-Tab list (Settings -> System -> Multitasking)
• Turn on clipboard history by hitting Windows-V
• Set Windows Terminal as default terminal application
• Enable Hyper-V (required for WSL)
  • Search for hyper-v in start menu, will show up in obscure UI for settings
• Enable Windows Sandbox
• Install Windows Subsystem for Linux via MS Store (doesn't seem to work in winget)
• Accept MS Store terms for winget, running winget list should prompt
• Get WinGet via MS Store via App Installer
  • winget install AgileBits.1Password
  • winget install Google.Chrome.Dev
  • winget install Microsoft.MouseandKeyboardCenter
  • winget install Microsoft.PowerShell
  • winget install Microsoft.PowerToys
  • winget install Microsoft.VisualStudioCode
  • winget install Mozilla.Firefox
  • winget install Neovim.Neovim
  • winget install Plex.PlexAmp
  • winget install ShareX.ShareX
  • winget install SourceFoundry.HackFonts
  • winget install Valve.Steam (if gaming)
  • winget install VideoLAN.VLC
  • winget install Zoom.Zoom
• Install Battle.net (Optional, if gaming)
• WSL
  • [Optional] Allocate more memory for WSL VM by creating/adding to %UserProfile%\.wslconfig:

    [wsl2]
    memory=16G
    

  • [Optional] Enable systemd for VM by creating/adding to /etc/wsl.conf:

    [boot]
    systemd=true
    

  • winget install Debian.Debian
  • sudo apt update && sudo apt dist-upgrade
  • Run ~/dotfiles/setup_machine
  • Set Debian as default terminal
  • To mount network shares, do something like this in /etc/fstab (drvfs special for WSL):

    \\machine-name\share	/mnt/machine-share	drvfs	defaults,ro,noatime,uid=1000,gid=1000,umask=022	0	0
    

• 1Password
  • Sign into account
• VS Code
  • Sign in via GitHub to sync
  • (optional) Sign into GitHub Co-pilot
  • Install extensions (in case sync doesn't work)
    • Copilot
    • SSH
    • WSL
    • vim
• ShareX
  • Configure output location to be Downloads
• Steam & Battle.net
  • Sign in and install games locally

Mac

Still a work in progress, but kinda works

• May want to install command line tools manually in order to get git: xcode-select --install
• Set terminal.app profile, send option as meta key
• terminal.app sucks with colors, so once installs happen, switch to Alacritty and pin it in the dock
• Make sure Rectangle.app starts on login
• Need to figure out how to use Hammerspoon to have media keys control cmus, instead of launching iTunes (gross)

TODO

• Figure out how to get M1 CI running to check builds
• Automate cleaning up old symlinked files via stow, for now can hack via

  find -L ~/.config -type l [-delete]

• Figure out what Windows 11 tweaks & usability improvements to copy

Known Issues

• Debian bookworm does a debian.sources file instead of sources.list, need to adjust setup_machine
• Media keys on Microsoft Ergonomic Keyboard sometimes aren't detected, disconnect/reconnect USB may be enough to fix?
• Mouse wheel speed also sometimes goes to a better default after disconnect/reconnect
• 1Password can't manage to save authentication, dies trying to talk to keychain via dbus (for some reason, looking for org.kde.kwalletd5 and ignores gnome keyring)
• exa is now unmaintained, need to either go to eza or lsd
• 1password GUI not installing correctly, something wrong w/ bash logic

Sway Migration

Work in progress. The Sway Wiki has some good links for migration, and there are useful tools as well

• Chromium: Need to either use command-line flags --ozone-platform-hint=auto or go to chrome://flags and set Preferred Ozone platform
• Read through this guide a bit more, lots of good detail and using debian and systemd to drive a bunch of stuff
• Notifications
  • sway-notification-center over dunst, much better
  • No need to start automatically, dbus does that
  • Figure out volume, etc controls in there. Can substitute for some of the waybar stuff
    • Looks like this is on newer version than what's in Debian repos, so need to either go to sid early, or just wait
    • Can also do arbitrary buttons?
  • Figure out how to show icons for screenshot, etc
  • Make styling a bit more consistent with rest of UX
• Bar
  • Figure out bar content, using some combination of waybar and the helpers
  • Music control
  • Better volume display
  • Screen recording indicator could be nice
• Figure out clipboard, likely wl-clipboard (wayclip not in repos)
• Need to hook up pipewire in tmux as well?
• Input / keyboard setup, mostly native in sway?
• swhkd to consider as hotkey handler, get sway out of the business?
• Update instructions for setup
  • get sway/config.local out of source control, etc
• Figure out how to make wacom tablet work (and update instructions)
  • OpenTabletDriver looks promising, but need to test
• Figure out how to get things using Wayland where necessary
  • Firefox, Chrome need flags
  • Signal as well, watch out for needing floating at start
    • signal-desktop --enable-features=UseOzonePlatform --ozone-platform=wayland
• Need to update screenshot scripts, will likely be grim / slurp / grimshot
  • Screen recording via wf-recorder?
• Volume keyboard controls not working
• Need a rofi replacement for app launching, window switching, and shutdown, etc commands.
  • Might consider just using a terminal with fzf, but need to figure out the data sources
  • wofi kinda working, need to get terminal apps running (e.g. htop)
  • Window switcher kinda works, need icons
• gammastep seems to work on Wayland, need to figure out all the launching, etc
  • gammastep-indicator broken due to not including /usr/lib/python3/dist-packages in PYTHONPATH, works if done manually, not sure if something wrong with sway config or what
  • Need to double-check at night, but should be good?
• dunst seems to support wayland, but need to get launching, etc.
  • Hm, dbus does this for us, probably fine
  • mako-notifier an option, need to configure in order to get icons
  • Tray doesn't seem to work? Should have gammastep there?
    • Tray does work, just nothing in it right now
• Need to port background drawing handling over, likely using swaybg or just native sway

Future Improvements

• Try switching from docker to podman
• Look into glances and btop
• (caniuse-cli)[https://github.com/sgentle/caniuse-cmd]
• Look into stevearc/conform.nvim
• Add Firefox Nightly
• Use native OSC52 support in Neovim instead of plugin
• sixel support in tmux 3.4, but gotta wait until it (hopefully) hits Debian backports
  • Once sixels are supported, can make a bunch of improvements to scripts here
  • May want to consider zellij which supports sixel? Currently slightly janky though
• wshowkeys or similar for showing keypresses for screencasts, etc
• Figure out Lutris / Wine / Proton for Linux gaming
• Auto-publish Docker images
• Better colorschemes, coordinated everywhere
  • Check themer for generation
  • Easier swapping into light mode
  • dircolors can be better and used elsewhere: https://github.com/seebi/dircolors-solarized
  • RootLoops for generation
• Figure out how to get USB-C DP Alt devices to work, might need displaylink-debian or at the very least evdi-dkms
• Get Nvidia Drivers drivers with a reasonable resolution for linux console
  • Install nvidia-detect and run to check support
  • Install nvidia-driver
  • Get better resolution when booted into console by adding GRUB_GFXMODE=auto in /etc/default/grub, then run sudo update-grub
• Learn from Wayland Apps in Wireguard Docker Containers and see if anything worth copying
• Dotfile managers might have something better than GNU stow