painless dotfiles synchronization and versioning using git

Synchronization of dotfiles has been documented to death in many blogs. But, I just wanted to show how I do it:

  1. Initialize (git init) a repository called dotfiles anywhere on your filesystem (I do it in ~/repos/core/).
  2. Copy your dotfiles to this directory, and arrange them in whatever order you want and add them to your git repository.
  3. Now, tweak the line#2 in the following script to include your dotfiles or folders and run it.
  4. Now, to sync your dotfiles seamlessly between your machines. You just need a remote git server (It can be your own using gitosis , or you can put it on github ). I use github to store my dotfiles. Just push your dotfiles to your remote server clone it on another machine run the setup.rb and bam, you’re in business.
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#!/bin/env ruby
dirs = %w(bash/.bash_aliases bash/.inputrc git/.gitconfig vim/.vim vim/.vimrc .gemrc)
current_dir = File.expand_path(Dir.pwd)
home_dir = File.expand_path("~")

dirs.each do |dir|
  dir = File.join(current_dir, dir)
  symlink = File.join(home_dir, File.basename(dir))
  `ln -ns #{dir} #{symlink}`
end

This way you don’t have to copy/paste the files when you make changes to them. Just change the file, commit and push, and pull it on the other machines.

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