Backing up Dotfiles

17 February 2023

Here's a walkthrough for backing up your dotfiles on git.

What are dotfiles

"Dotfiles" are those files that sit in some root directory, are hidden by their . prefix and configure stuff.

A common example is the configuration file for your code editor.

In nvim, this is the file at ~/.config/nvim/init.lua. If you were on vim, this is the equivalent of your ~/.vim/vimrc file or your emacs ~/.emacs.d/init.el.

As an example, here's how you can back up your init.lua for neovim config on git.

Write your init.lua

This editor config file fits in a wide class of files that I call dotfiles -- those files that sit in some root directory, are hidden by their . prefix and configure stuff.

I put this init.lua file in a gitrepo, along with other dotfiles:

mkdir -p ~/dev/dotfiles/nvim

nvim ~/dev/dotfiles/init.lua

Back up your dotfiles

Now instead of just leaving this file on your local machine, you can clone it somewhere on git:

cd ~/dev/dotfiles
git init
git remote add origin git@github.com:jaketrent/dotfiles.git
git add .
git commit -m "initial commit"
git push origin HEAD

Now instead of using the generated nvim init.lua defaults, if they've been made, we're going to delete them:

cd ~/.config/

rm -rf nvim

Once they're deleted, now we can create a soft symlink to the dotfiles repo directory for nvim:

ln -s ~/dev/dotfiles/nvim

Let's verify that the link points to the right place:

❯ ls -la
...
lrwxr-xr-x    1 jaketrent  staff    34 Jul  5 08:45 nvim -> /Users/jaketrent/dev/dotfiles/nvim
...

Then start nvim and immediately run the scriptnames command:

nvim +scriptnames

The output should include the init.lua, in your dotfiles directory, meaning that vim is running with that script loaded:

after/plugin
  ...
  3: ~/dev/dotfiles/nvim/init.lua
  ...

Now get configuring, and make nvim yours!

Reversing the process

Let's say that have the init.lua file in git somewhere, and now you have a new local computer. You need to clone that repo and then link it in the ~/.config folder in the same way:

mkdir ~/dev
cd ~/dev
git clone git@github.com:jaketrent/dotfiles.git
cd ~/.config
ln -s ~/dev/dotfiles/nvim

Full circle. Never lose your nvim config again.