Setup | Bas Nijholt

Two years on the Glove80: a split ergonomic, programmable keyboard as a programmer ⌨️

Thu, 06 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Table of contents

Why I switched #

For roughly three years I used the Logitech Ergo K860. Despite liking it, I kept getting RSI (Repetitive Strain Injury) flare‑ups—pain and discomfort from repetitive typing motions. ~2 years ago I discovered that split ergonomic keyboards were a thing and went down the rabbit hole. I switched to the Glove80 in January 2024. Before I bought anything, I started watching videos from the channel If Coding Were Natural and from Ben Vallack. I read many reviews and first‑hand experiences. The more I watched and read, the more my interest in split ergonomic keyboards grew. Overwhelmingly, people seemed to praise the Glove80 for its comfort, so I decided to try it. I considered many alternatives like the Moonlander and Ergodox but chose the Glove80 for its lighter switches and curved key wells.

Before the Glove80, I had flirted with mechanical keyboards because the community is huge and very into them. Given the nerd that I am, I got nerd‑sniped by the mechanical‑keyboard scene. I assumed I would be into mechanical keyboards. In April 2019, I ordered a 60% board, the Anne Pro 2. After trying it, I returned it because it wasn’t an improvement for me and the reduced ergonomics weren’t worth it compared to the Logitech. The mechanical switches didn’t really excite me in practice as much as I had expected. What I actually needed was a split, columnar layout with thumb clusters and programmability. I didn’t know this yet.

Split ergonomic keyboards: What makes them different? #

Before diving into my experience, here’s what sets these keyboards apart from traditional ones.

Columnar layout #

Columns line up under each finger, so most movements are up/down instead of sideways. Compared to row‑staggered boards, this reduces lateral finger travel and awkward cross‑overs. Row‑staggered boards offset keys sideways, which encourages lateral travel rather than straight motions.

Vertical column‑stagger #

Each column is offset to match finger length, which reduces awkward reaches for ring and pinky fingers and keeps wrists more neutral. The middle finger column sits higher, the pinky column lower—matching the natural length differences between fingers.

Split halves #

Two halves let shoulders and wrists stay in a neutral, shoulder‑width posture. One‑piece boards tend to pull shoulders inward and bend wrists sideways (called ulnar deviation). With the split, I can position each half independently for my body.

Key wells #

Curved wells bring keycaps closer to your finger pads along natural arcs, so you extend and lift your fingers less. Flat boards make you lift and extend fingers more and move farther between rows. The Glove80’s wells are subtle but noticeable after hours of typing.

Thumb clusters #

Modifiers, Backspace, Enter, and other frequent keys can live under your strongest digits—the thumbs—instead of overloading pinkies. Big space bars under‑utilize thumbs and push more work to pinkies and corners. On the Glove80, my thumbs handle multiple keys that would normally require pinky reaches.

Tenting #

Tenting means raising one side of the keyboard to adjust the angle. I tent the halves to a mild angle so my forearms don’t have to twist as much (less pronation) and my wrists stay more neutral. Most standard keyboards cannot tent at all, which forces your palms completely flat and pulls your shoulders inward.

Switches #

I use Kailh Choc Red Pro switches on my Glove80. They are linear with a low actuation force, which feels light and comfortable for long typing. I don’t have much experience with other switches, so this is not a comparison—just what works for me.

Left half of my Glove80 showing the columnar columns, thumb cluster, and mild tenting.

Taken together, these differences mean less strain and more consistent typing for me than on row‑staggered boards.

The first month: Comfort vs. disruption #

After spending a month on the Glove80, I found it much more comfortable than expected. At the same time, it completely disrupted my typing strategy—what I had learned on a traditional layout didn’t transfer to the columnar layout of the Glove80.

What was frustrating #

In the first couple of days, my typing speed tanked and it was extremely frustrating. On the first day, I was at 22 wpm—slower than hunt-and-peck typing. I was constantly looking at the keyboard, trying to use the right fingers for the right keys. On a traditional keyboard I had my own strategy—basically three fingers per hand—and I was actually very fast with it. But that didn’t transfer at all to the columnar layout; using the “right” finger for each column felt natural once learned, but it wasn’t native to me at first. I did not want to give up and kept going despite the massive frustration. Maybe what kept me going was the sunk‑cost fallacy of $400 (which is mid-range for split ergonomic keyboards, they typically run 200-600 USD).

Practice tools that helped #

I started with Keybr to learn key‑by‑key. Once I finished that, I switched to using MonkeyType exclusively. After 1–2 months I had already reached ~85 wpm (words per minute—average typing speed is 40 wpm, programmers often type 60-80 wpm). I haven’t improved a whole lot since then, but I also haven’t done dedicated typing practice. While writing this post I tried MonkeyType again and I’m now ~90 wpm.

My Keybr progress during the first 4 weeks: starting at ~20 wpm, both speed and accuracy steadily improved over each lesson.

Beyond the tools, a few things helped with the transition: the Glove80’s columnar layout actually forces you to use the correct finger for each column—using the wrong finger feels completely unnatural and awkward, so I had to abandon my old three-finger strategy. I also had to accept the short-term speed dip while accuracy improved, and adding slight tenting helped keep my wrists more neutral.

Today, it feels completely natural for me to type on this keyboard.

Programmable features that make a difference #

These keyboards let you program behaviors that eliminate awkward reaches and repetitive strain. Here’s what I actually use:

Mod-tap: One key, two functions #

Keys do different things based on tap vs. hold. All my symbols work this way:

Tap 1 = “1”, hold for ~200ms = “!”
Tap , = “,”, hold = “<”
Tap . = “.”, hold = “>”

This keeps everything on the home row without reaching to a symbols row.

Sticky modifiers: Tap instead of hold #

All my modifiers are “sticky”—tap them once and they latch for the next key:

Tap Command + Shift, then tap T = reopens last tab
No more finger gymnastics holding three keys at once

With a single thumb movement on my left hand, I can reopen a tab quickly.

Layers: Multiple keyboards in one #

Multiple virtual keymaps on one keyboard. You can momentarily switch or toggle to a layer to get different keys under the same physical switches. Common patterns include a symbols layer, a navigation layer, and a numbers/function layer—all reachable from home row.

One of my layers: digits act as mod‑taps for symbols, and common modifiers live under the thumbs.

The “hyper” key shortcut #

If I hold the Home key, it acts as if I’m pressing Ctrl + Alt + Shift + Command simultaneously (the “hyper” key I mentioned earlier). Since few apps use that combo by default, I map it to custom commands:

Home + T → open Terminal
Home + B → open Browser
Home + C → open Calendar
Home + S → open Slack

This hyper key setup enabled my keyboard-first workflow across macOS (using Keyboard Maestro) and Linux (using Hyprland). The same muscle memory works across both systems, relieving me from tapping Command+Tab like a mad person.

More programmable tricks I use (details)

Double‑tap Shift → emulate mouse behavior on keyboard
- A quick double‑tap of Shift toggles my mouse behavior layer so I can move/scroll/click without leaving the home row.
Double‑tap Command → macOS‑style word navigation on Linux
- I use this to mirror macOS word‑jump behavior in Linux editors/terminals, so ⌘ + arrows behaves the same everywhere.
Combos for common keys
- E + D → Enter; R + F → Space. This lets me press Enter and Space with my left hand while my right hand is on the mouse, since those keys sit on the right side on many layouts. I also keep most app‑switch launchers on the left side so my left hand can trigger them while my right hand stays on the mouse.
Shift + Backspace → Delete
- Backspace morphs into Delete when Shift is held—handy on macOS/Linux.
Tap dance to momentary vs. toggle a layer
- Single tap for a momentary “Lower,” double tap to lock it on; keeps symbols/nav nearby without mode churn.
Mouse keys with speed profiles
- Separate slow/fast/warp cursor and scroll speeds for precision vs. movement.
Delete to start/end of line
- One chord deletes left to line start; another deletes right to line end—great for editors.
Tuning for fewer misfires
- Tap‑preferred hold‑taps and a ~200–220 ms tapping term match my timing.

None of this requires you to become a firmware expert on day one. Even a couple of well‑chosen mod‑taps, one sticky key, and a single “symbols + navigation” layer can remove a lot of awkward reaches.

What I’d tell my past self #

Expect an initial drop in speed; it’s normal.
Columnar layouts reward correct finger usage; looking down at first is fine.
Start simple: one or two mod‑taps, one sticky modifier, one extra layer.
Practice compounds. MonkeyType and Keybr were enough for me.
Don’t let sunk‑cost thinking scare you into quitting, but also don’t over‑engineer your layout on day one.
You won’t lose the ability to type on normal keyboards. When I type on my laptop’s built‑in keyboard, I just use my original three-finger strategy and have no issues. It’s like developing two different muscle memories based on the keyboard.
Gaming consideration: WASD sits off the natural columns on a columnar split. I briefly tried a shooter and it felt awkward—unless you’re willing to reprogram and relearn gaming muscle memory, FPS games don’t work well. I only played Factorio on it, which worked fine.

Where I am now #

As of November 2025, I’m ~90 wpm, and it feels completely natural to type on the Glove80. I reached 85 wpm within 1–2 months and have mostly stayed in that range since, with a small bump recently. The comfort gains are real, and the programmability (mod‑tap, sticky keys, and layers) turned out to be as exciting in practice as it sounded when I first discovered it. Was the $400 worth it? Absolutely! I probably spent many thousands of hours on it so far, so amortizing it over its lifetime, it’s well worth it for me. Plus it makes me feel like a leet hacker.

My current Glove80 layout: view it here.

What’s next? #

The Glove80 perfectly meets my needs—I have no practical reason to switch. But the nerd inside me is curious about other options in the split keyboard ecosystem. The Corne, Svalboard, and Cyboard Imprint all take quite different approaches and seem interesting to explore. Whether I’ll actually try them or stick with what works is an open question—sometimes the best keyboard is the one you’ve already mastered.

Community and support #

The MoErgo Glove80 community is extremely welcoming. Stephen, the designer, is very active and responsive—when I requested a small feature for the layout editor, it went live within a day.

Open-sourcing my dotfiles: a practical, cross-platform terminal setup 🏠

Sat, 05 Apr 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Introduction #

Many of us spend a significant amount of time in the terminal. Over the years, I’ve found that investing in a well-organized and consistent command-line environment pays dividends in productivity and, frankly, makes the daily grind more enjoyable. After refining my personal setup across more than 10 different machines – ranging from my primary MacBooks to Linux servers (x86/ARM), Raspberry Pis in my homelab, cloud VMs, and even my iPhone via iSH – I’ve decided it’s time to share it publicly. The need for a consistent experience across such diverse hardware and operating systems was a major driving force behind this setup’s evolution.

Today, I’m open sourcing my complete dotfiles repository 🎉. This isn’t about presenting a “perfect” solution, but rather sharing a practical system that has evolved to handle real-world needs like cross-platform consistency, easy setup on new machines, and integrating modern CLI tools effectively. If you’re looking for ideas to streamline your own terminal workflow, I hope you find something useful here.

Table of contents

Why Open Source Now? #

I have maintained my dotfiles for many years in a private repository. Sharing this setup feels like a natural step for a few reasons:

Sharing Solutions: This setup incorporates solutions to problems I’ve wrestled with, like managing binaries without sudo (leading to my dotbins tool), achieving consistent SSH agent behavior, or getting Python environments to activate seamlessly with direnv.
Giving Back: I’ve learned a lot from countless other dotfiles repos and articles shared by the community. It feels right to contribute my own approach.
Transparency & Learning: Open sourcing allows others to see how different pieces fit together and perhaps adapt ideas for their own configurations.

However, the driving force was the recent creation of my dotbins tool and honestly, I just want to share “my way” of doing things.

Core Ideas & Highlights #

My setup is built around a few key principles aimed at practicality and efficiency:

1. Cross-Platform & Shell Agnostic #

It’s designed to work reliably on macOS (aarch64) and various Linux distros (x86_64, aarch64). While Zsh is my preference (leveraging Oh-My-Zsh), the core configurations in configs/shell/ are sourced by both .zshrc and .bash_profile, ensuring basic compatibility.

2. Modularity for Sanity #

Instead of one giant config file, the shell setup is broken down logically:

configs/shell/
├── 00_prefer_zsh.sh # Switches Bash users to Zsh if available
├── 10_aliases.sh # Common aliases
├── 20_exports.sh # Environment variables
├── 30_misc.sh # Dotbins init, secrets sourcing
├── 40_keychain.sh # SSH agent setup (Keychain/1Password)
├── 50_python.sh # Python env helpers (conda, uv, direnv)
# ... and others for Zsh specifics, SLURM, etc.
└── main.sh # Sources the relevant files above

This makes it much easier to understand, maintain, and debug specific parts of the configuration. My actual .zshrc and .bash_profile just source main.sh.

3. Automation via Dotbot #

A core goal here is a true ./install and done setup. Dotbot is key to this automation. Setting up a new machine or syncing changes is streamlined using this tool. The install.conf.yaml file defines which config files get symlinked where, and runs initial setup commands. This includes updating submodules and, importantly, using uv tool install to install a curated list of essential Python CLI tools (ruff, pre-commit, dotbins itself, etc.) globally, ensuring they’re immediately available after installation. For remote machines, scripts/sync-dotfiles.sh handles pulling updates and optionally re-running the install.

4. Hassle-Free CLI Tools with `dotbins` #

Modern CLI tools are fantastic, but installing them everywhere, especially without sudo, can be a pain. I built dotbins to solve this. It downloads pre-compiled binaries for specified tools directly from GitHub releases, organizing them by platform/architecture.

# Snippet from ~/.dotbins/dotbins.yaml
tools:
 delta: dandavison/delta # Git diff tool
 eza: eza-community/eza # Modern 'ls'
 zoxide: ajeetdsouza/zoxide # Smarter 'cd'
 starship: starship/starship # Shell prompt
 atuin: atuinsh/atuin # Shell history sync
 # ... plus tools with shell integration code

The shell setup automatically adds the correct binary path and runs any needed initialization. More details in my dotbins post.

5. Sensible SSH Key Management #

Using Funtoo Keychain, often integrated with the 1Password CLI for passphrase retrieval, means I typically only deal with my SSH key passphrase once per login session. This setup is detailed here.

6. (macOS) Declarative Setup with Nix-Darwin #

On my Macs, I use Nix-Darwin to manage system settings and even Homebrew packages declaratively (configs/nix-darwin/). Running nixswitch applies the entire configuration, making macOS setups highly reproducible.

A Note on Alternatives & Design Choices #

You might wonder why I haven’t adopted certain popular tools or approaches. Here’s some rationale behind the choices made in this setup:

Why not fish shell? While fish offers many appealing modern features (and its Rust rewrite is intriguing!), a core requirement for my setup is broad compatibility. I need my core shell environment to function reliably even on minimal Linux systems (servers, containers, HPC nodes) where bash is often the only guarantee. For this reason, I use zsh as a powerful, yet largely POSIX-compatible, middle ground that works well across my diverse environments without requiring a non-standard shell installation everywhere.
Why iTerm2 on macOS? I’ve experimented with newer terminals like WezTerm, Ghostty, Kitty, and Alacritty. Many offer benefits like impressive speed and GPU rendering. However, I consistently return to iTerm2.
- Criticisms & Rebuttals: iTerm2 is often criticized for being “bloated” or “slow,” and historically, its settings weren’t easily version controllable. Frankly, on modern hardware, any perceived slowness is negligible for my use cases. More importantly, iTerm2 does allow its profiles to be saved as JSON (see my Profiles.json in this repo), making the configuration easily version controlled via dotfiles.
- The Killer Feature: The primary reason I stick with iTerm2 is its robust Semantic History feature. The ability to Cmd-Click URLs/filenames in terminal output – even complex ones with line numbers like src/my_module/file.py:123 – and have them open directly in VS Code at the correct line is indispensable for my debugging and development workflow. I haven’t found this replicated with the same reliability and ease of configuration elsewhere.
- Other Features: I also like simple features selecting text and (without ⌘+C!) pasting it right back into the terminal, and the window and tab management features.
- Ghostty Example: I recently tried Ghostty and liked many aspects, but quickly ran into limitations that highlighted my reliance on iTerm2 features, such as the lack of built-in text search, scrollbars, and crucially, the clickable file paths with line numbers (as discussed here).
Why Dotbot/Git over chezmoi? Chezmoi is a very popular and powerful dotfiles manager, often praised for its templating and management features. However, I prefer the directness of using git for version control and Dotbot for simple symlinking. My setup is the Git repository, which feels intuitive. Crucially, I rely heavily on Git submodules (perhaps Git’s least loved feature 🤔) to manage external tools and plugins directly within my dotfiles repo. This submodule-centric approach integrates seamlessly with a standard Git workflow, which made Dotbot a more natural fit for me than chezmoi’s model.
No sudo Required: A key design principle is that the installation process via ./install (Dotbot symlinking, uv tool install, dotbins fetching binaries) operates entirely within the user’s home directory. No sudo access is needed to get the core environment up and running. This makes the setup viable in restricted environments like HPC clusters, shared servers, or locked-down corporate machines where admin rights aren’t available.

A Look Inside: Structure #

The repository is organized to keep things separated logically:

.
├── configs/ # Configs (atuin, bash, git, nix, shell, zsh...)
├── install # Main installation script (runs dotbot)
├── install.conf.yaml # Dotbot: Links configs, runs setup commands
├── scripts/ # Utility scripts (syncing, backups, helpers)
├── submodules/ # External tools managed as submodules (dotbot, dotbins, plugins...)
└── README.md # Detailed overview

Getting Started #

If you want to try this setup or adapt parts of it:

Prerequisites: git is essential. SSH access to GitHub is needed if you fork and want to manage the private secrets submodule or other private submodules.

Clone:

# Clone recursively to get submodules
git clone --recurse-submodules -j8 git@github.com:basnijholt/dotfiles.git
cd dotfiles

Install:
```
./install
```
This single command runs Dotbot, which handles creating configuration symlinks, updating Git submodules, and installing numerous Python tools via uv (as defined in install.conf.yaml). Combined with dotbins automatically fetching other pre-compiled binaries, your environment should be remarkably complete after this step. Restart your shell after it finishes.
⚠️ Important: Customize!
- Fork the repository first! Don’t use my configuration directly, especially configs/git/gitconfig.
- Update configs/git/gitconfig with your name and email.
- Review install.conf.yaml – remove links or shell commands you don’t need. You can see the full list of Python tools installed via uv here.
- Modify configs/shell/ files to suit your workflow.
- Adjust the dotbins configuration (submodules/dotbins/dotbins.yaml) to include your favorite tools.

A Note on Secrets #

Sensitive information (API keys, etc.) is not stored directly in the public repository. I use a private Git repository included as a submodule (secrets/). This requires SSH authentication. Within that private repo, I use gpg and git-secret to encrypt sensitive files, adding another layer of security. You’ll need your own strategy for managing secrets, whether it’s a similar private repo, environment variables, or a dedicated secrets manager.

Conclusion #

This dotfiles setup represents my ongoing effort to build a productive, consistent, and enjoyable terminal environment across a diverse range of machines – from personal laptops to homelab servers and cloud instances. It solves real problems I’ve encountered in maintaining that consistency. By sharing it, I hope to offer some practical ideas and perhaps save others some time in crafting their own ideal setup.

Feel free to explore the repository, borrow what you find useful, and adapt it to your needs. If you find it helpful, consider giving it a star! If you have suggestions or find issues, contributions are welcome!

Happy terminal tinkering!

Further Reading & Links:

My Dotfiles Repository on GitHub
Blog Post: My Homelab Setup
Blog Post: Be a Ninja in the Terminal 🥷
Blog Post: dotbins: Managing Binary Tools in Your Dotfiles 🧰
Blog Post: Combining Keychain and 1Password CLI for SSH Agent Management
Dotbot
Dotbins
Git Secret
iTerm2

Combining Keychain and 1Password CLI for ssh-agent management

Sun, 30 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Combining Keychain and 1Password CLI for SSH Agent Management #

For about a decade, I’ve relied on two key tools in my development workflow: Funtoo Keychain for managing my ssh-agent and 1Password for securely storing secrets. While I used them extensively, I never actually integrated them directly for SSH key passphrase handling.

Recently, with the advent of 1Password’s built-in SSH agent, I gave it a try, attracted by the promise of managing keys directly within my vault. However, I quickly found myself frequently prompted for my master password or biometrics, which interrupted my flow more often than I preferred compared to Keychain’s persistence.

This led me back to the reliable “unlock once per session” behavior of Keychain. But the experience using the 1Password Command-Line Interface (op) during that time sparked an idea: could I combine the persistence of Keychain with the secure passphrase retrieval of the op CLI? The answer is yes, and this post outlines the setup that achieves that balance.

The Goal: Use 1Password as the secure vault for the SSH key passphrase but rely on keychain to manage the ssh-agent process and ensure the key, once unlocked, remains available for the entire login session without further prompts from 1Password.

Why This Approach?

This setup directly addresses the trade-off I encountered. Funtoo keychain excels at starting ssh-agent reliably on login and keeping keys available throughout a session with just one initial unlock. While the native 1Password agent is convenient for vault integration, its session management, in my experience, led to more frequent authentication prompts than desired for long-running sessions.

By using keychain for agent management and calling the op CLI via the standard SSH_ASKPASS mechanism only for the initial key load, we get the best of both worlds: 1Password’s secure storage for the passphrase and Keychain’s persistent agent access with minimal prompting after the first unlock.

The Components:

Funtoo keychain: Manages ssh-agent lifecycle and loads specified keys.
1Password CLI (op): Securely retrieves secrets (the passphrase) from your 1Password vault. Requires op to be installed and logged in.
askpass-1password.sh: A small helper script that ssh-add (via keychain) calls to get the passphrase. This script invokes op.
setup_ssh_agent.sh: A script sourced by your shell startup file (.zshrc, .bashrc, etc.) to orchestrate the setup.

Implementation:

Step 1: Create the askpass Helper Script

This script simply calls op read to fetch the passphrase using its Secret Reference URI.

Find your SSH key item in 1Password.
Locate the passphrase field, click the options/arrow, and copy the “Copy Secret Reference”.
Create the script at ~/.ssh/askpass-1password.sh:

#!/bin/sh
# ~/.ssh/askpass-1password.sh
# Provides the SSH key passphrase from 1Password CLI via SSH_ASKPASS

# Paste your Secret Reference URI here
OP_SECRET_REFERENCE="op://YourVault/YourSSHKeyItem/password"

# Use 'op read' to retrieve and print the passphrase to stdout
# Requires 1Password CLI ('op') to be installed and authenticated.
op read "$OP_SECRET_REFERENCE"

Make it executable: chmod u+x ~/.ssh/askpass-1password.sh

Step 2: Create the Setup Orchestration Script

This script checks if op is available and conditionally configures keychain to use the helper script.

(Adjust path ~/dotfiles/scripts/setup_ssh_agent.sh as needed)

#!/bin/zsh
# ~/dotfiles/scripts/setup_ssh_agent.sh - Sets up ssh-agent via keychain.
# If 'op' CLI and the askpass helper script are available, uses 1Password for passphrase.
# Intended to be sourced by .zshrc or similar.

_askpass_helper="$HOME/.ssh/askpass-1password.sh"
_askpass_vars_set=false

# Check if 'op' CLI is installed and the helper script is usable
if command -v op >/dev/null 2>&1 && [[ -f "$_askpass_helper" ]] && [[ -x "$_askpass_helper" ]]; then
 # Configure environment for 1Password helper script
 export SSH_ASKPASS="$_askpass_helper"
 export SSH_ASKPASS_REQUIRE="prefer" # Use ASKPASS even in terminals
 _askpass_vars_set=true
fi

# Execute keychain to start/find agent, load key, and set env vars
# (Adjust key name 'id_ed25519' as needed)
eval $(keychain --eval --quiet --agents ssh --inherit any-once id_ed25519)

# Clean up ASKPASS variables if they were set
if $_askpass_vars_set; then
 unset SSH_ASKPASS
 unset SSH_ASKPASS_REQUIRE
fi

Step 3: Source the Setup Script in .zshrc

Add this to your ~/.zshrc (or equivalent):

# --- SSH Agent Configuration (via keychain & 1Password) ---
# Source the dedicated setup script if it exists.
_ssh_setup_script="${HOME}/dotfiles/scripts/setup_ssh_agent.sh"
if [[ -f "$_ssh_setup_script" ]]; then
 source "$_ssh_setup_script"
fi
# --- End SSH Agent Configuration ---

How It Works:

When you start a new shell session, .zshrc sources setup_ssh_agent.sh.
The script checks if op is installed and the askpass-1password.sh helper is ready.
If yes, it sets the SSH_ASKPASS and SSH_ASKPASS_REQUIRE environment variables.
It runs keychain --eval id_ed25519.
keychain starts or connects to ssh-agent and uses ssh-add to load id_ed25519.
ssh-add sees SSH_ASKPASS is set and executes askpass-1password.sh.
The helper script runs op read ....
The 1Password CLI handles authentication (prompting for your master password or using biometrics/system auth if necessary based on its current session state – typically only if the op session has expired).
op read outputs the passphrase.
ssh-add receives the passphrase and unlocks the key, adding it to the agent.
keychain --eval outputs the necessary export SSH_AUTH_SOCK=... commands.
eval executes these commands, configuring your current shell to use the agent.
The ASKPASS variables are unset.

Conclusion:

After years of using Funtoo Keychain and 1Password separately, and a brief foray into the native 1Password agent, this combined approach hits the sweet spot for me. It leverages 1Password’s secure vault for storing the SSH key passphrase but restores the “unlock once per session” convenience I appreciate from keychain. It requires a single passphrase entry via 1Password when the key is first added (typically on login/boot), after which the key remains available via the standard ssh-agent mechanism without further 1Password interaction for that session.

dotbins: managing binary tools in your dotfiles 🧰

Tue, 11 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

In my previous post about terminal productivity, I shared a setup combining tools like zsh, oh-my-zsh, zsh-z, and various plugins to create a highly efficient command-line environment. While that setup served me well for years, I’ve recently encountered a challenge: incorporating modern, compiled CLI tools across all my environments without administrative privileges.

Today, I’m excited to introduce dotbins - a solution I created to solve this exact problem.

The Modern CLI Tools Problem #

Over the past few years, we’ve seen an explosion of incredible, modern CLI tools written in languages like Rust and Go. Tools like:

zoxide (a smarter, faster alternative to zsh-z)
bat (a cat replacement with syntax highlighting)
eza (a modern ls alternative)
delta (a better diff viewer for Git)
fzf (a fuzzy finder for your terminal)
ripgrep (a faster, better grep)
atuin (a shell history with search and sync)

These tools significantly enhance terminal productivity, but they come with a catch: they’re compiled binaries, not simple scripts. While my previous setup worked well because all the tools were basic shell scripts I could include as submodules in my dotfiles repository, these modern alternatives require installation.

This became frustrating when working on:

Remote systems where I lacked admin/sudo permissions
Machines that I use only temporarily
Systems where I didn’t want to install package managers

I’d spend time carefully setting up my dotfiles with all my configurations, only to find that the actual tools they relied on weren’t available.

Enter `dotbins` 🧰 #

dotbins was born out of this frustration. It’s a utility that manages pre-compiled binaries for CLI tools across multiple platforms and architectures, right in your dotfiles repository.

The key insight: track pre-compiled binaries in a separate Git repository (using Git LFS for efficiency), include this repository as a submodule in your dotfiles, and ensure all your essential tools are immediately available on any system.

No package manager, no sudo, no problem.

How `dotbins` Works #

dotbins handles several critical tasks:

Downloads binaries directly from GitHub releases for your selected tools
Organizes them by platform (macOS, Linux) and architecture (amd64, arm64)
Tracks installed versions and update timestamps
Extracts binaries from archives in various formats
Integrates seamlessly with your shell via a simple PATH addition

The configuration is straightforward - a YAML file where you define which tools you want and how to get them:

tools:
 ripgrep:
 repo: BurntSushi/ripgrep
 extract_binary: true
 binary_name: rg
 binary_path: ripgrep-*/rg
 asset_patterns:
 linux: ripgrep-{version}-{arch}-unknown-linux-musl.tar.gz
 macos: ripgrep-{version}-{arch}-apple-darwin.tar.gz
 arch_map:
 amd64: x86_64
 arm64: aarch64

My Workflow: A Two-Repository Approach #

My approach uses two repositories:

Private dotfiles repository containing all my configurations
Public mydotbins repository containing all the binaries

I include mydotbins as a submodule in my dotfiles repository. This separation keeps large binary files out of my main dotfiles repository and allows me to share the binary collection publicly while keeping my personal configurations private.

When I clone my dotfiles on a new system, I get not just my configuration files, but also all the CLI tools I depend on for productivity.

Modern Alternatives to My Previous Setup #

With dotbins, I’ve been able to upgrade several tools from my previous setup:

Old Tool	Modern Alternative	Advantage
`zsh-z`	`zoxide`	Faster, smarter, works across shells
`cat`	`bat`	Syntax highlighting, Git integration
`ls`	`eza`	Better formatting, Git integration
`grep`	`ripgrep`	Much faster, respects `.gitignore`
Control + R	`atuin`	Shell history with search and sync
Default Git diff	`delta`	Syntax highlighting, better visual diffs
N/A	`fzf`	Fuzzy finding makes everything better
N/A	`atuin`	Shell history with search and sync

The best part? All of these are now automatically available on every machine where I clone my dotfiles, without any additional installation steps.

Getting Started with `dotbins` #

If you’d like to adopt this approach, here’s how to get started:

Install dotbins:

pip install dotbins
# Or better yet, use uv:
uvx dotbins

Create a configuration file at ~/.config/dotbins/config.yaml:

tools_dir: ~/.mydotbins/tools

platforms:
 linux:
 - amd64
 - arm64
 macos:
 - arm64

tools:
 # Add your favorite tools here
 fzf:
 repo: junegunn/fzf
 extract_binary: true
 binary_name: fzf
 binary_path: fzf
 asset_patterns: fzf-{version}-{platform}_{arch}.tar.gz
 platform_map:
 macos: darwin

Initialize and download your tools:
```
dotbins init
dotbins update
```

Add the shell integration to your .zshrc or .bashrc:

# dotbins - Add platform-specific binaries to PATH
_os=$(uname -s | tr '[:upper:]' '[:lower:]')
[[ "$_os" == "darwin" ]] && _os="macos"

_arch=$(uname -m)
[[ "$_arch" == "x86_64" ]] && _arch="amd64"
[[ "$_arch" == "aarch64" || "$_arch" == "arm64" ]] && _arch="arm64"

export PATH="$HOME/.mydotbins/tools/$_os/$_arch/bin:$PATH"

(Optional) Track your binaries in a separate Git repository with Git LFS for efficiency

Finding New Tools to Add #

Not sure which pattern to use for a new tool? The analyze command is here to help:

dotbins analyze sharkdp/bat

This will suggest a configuration for the tool based on its GitHub release assets.

Conclusion: The Evolution of My Terminal Setup #

With dotbins, my terminal productivity setup has evolved beyond what I described in my previous post. I can now seamlessly incorporate the best modern CLI tools without worrying about installation or administrative privileges.

The beauty of this approach is its portability—I get a consistent, powerful environment on any machine where I clone my dotfiles.

If you’re a terminal power user who works across multiple environments, give dotbins a try. It might just be the missing piece in your dotfiles setup!

My macOS setup: Homebrew, apps, and defaults 🍏

Fri, 21 Apr 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Introduction #

Setting up a new MacOS installation can be a tedious process. This blog post will guide you through the essential steps and applications to install when setting up your fresh MacOS environment. I’ll cover a few unavoidable manual installations, homebrew, iTerm and VS Code font, oh-my-zsh, but can automate most other things.

Note that this is just what I have been doing for the last years, and you might want to do things differently.

Table of contents

1. Manual Installations #

First, let’s manually install some essential tools and software:

homebrew, the essential package manager for MacOS
micromamba, my preferred conda package manager which is blazingly fast
Chrome (manual install because the brew version doesn’t work with 1Password)
File-up, a simple tool I made to upload files to an FTP server and copy the URL to the clipboard (optional)

Set a host file to block unwanted websites and advertisements.

2. Homebrew #

Homebrew is a powerful package manager for MacOS. It allows you to quickly and easily install, update, and remove software.

To install a long list of essential applications and tools, run the following commands in your terminal (click to unfold):

brew install --cask \
 adobe-creative-cloud \
 adobe-digital-editions \
 airflow \
 avast-security \
 balenaetcher \
 bartender \
 bettertouchtool \
 brave-browser \
 cakebrew \
 calibre \
 chromedriver \
 cryptomator \
 db-browser-for-sqlite \
 disk-inventory-x \
 docker \
 dropbox \
 eqmac \
 exodus \
 filebot \
 firefox \
 flux \
 github \
 google-chrome \
 handbrake \
 hiddenbar \
 homebrew/cask-fonts/font-fira-code \
 inkscape \
 istat-menus \
 iterm2 \
 jabref \
 karabiner-elements \
 keepingyouawake \
 licecap \
 lulu \
 lyx \
 macfuse \
 mactex \
 mactracker \
 mendeley \
 microsoft-azure-storage-explorer \
 microsoft-office \
 microsoft-teams \
 monitorcontrol \
 mounty \
 mpv \
 musicbrainz-picard \
 nordvpn \
 obs \
 obsidian \
 onyx \
 protonmail-bridge \
 qbittorrent \
 qlvideo \
 raycast \
 rectangle \
 rotki \
 sabnzbd \
 selfcontrol \
 signal \
 skype \
 sloth \
 spotify \
 steam \
 switchresx \
 syncthing \
 teamviewer \
 telegram \
 tor-browser \
 tunnelblick \
 unclack \
 universal-media-server \
 visual-studio-code \
 vlc \
 webtorrent \
 xquartz \
 zoom

brew install \
 autossh \
 azure-cli \
 bat \
 brew-cask-completion \
 cointop \
 gh \
 gifsicle \
 git \
 git-extras \
 git-lfs \
 git-secret \
 gnupg \
 go \
 graphviz \
 gromgit/fuse/ext4fuse-mac \
 gromgit/fuse/ntfs-3g-mac \
 gromgit/fuse/sshfs-mac \
 homebrew/tex/git-latexdiff \
 htop \
 hugo \
 imagemagick \
 jq \
 keychain \
 micro \
 microsoft/git/git-credential-manager-core \
 nano \
 openjdk \
 pipx \
 rbenv \
 rclone \
 rsync \
 ruby \
 rustup-init \
 ssh-copy-id \
 starship \
 terraform \
 tmux \
 wget \
 yq \
 zsh

Otherwise, you can install the essential applications and tools one by one.

1. 🌐 Browsers #

Brave Browser 🛡️🦁

A privacy-focused browser with built-in adblocker and support for Chrome extensions, rewarding content creators via BAT tokens.

Install with brew install --cask brave-browser
See the formula , repo , and docs

Chrome 🌐💨

A fast and user-friendly browser with seamless Google service integration and extensive extension library.

Install with brew install --cask google-chrome
See the formula , repo , and docs

Firefox 🔓🦊

An open-source browser prioritizing user privacy and security, offering a customizable experience with various add-ons.

Install with brew install --cask firefox
See the formula , repo , and docs

2. 🛠️ Productivity Tools #

Bartender 🍸🖥️

A utility to organize and manage your Mac’s menu bar icons, improving aesthetics and accessibility.

Install with brew install --cask bartender
See the formula

BetterTouchTool 👆🛠️

A customizable input device manager that enables advanced gesture control and shortcuts for your Mac.

Install with brew install --cask bettertouchtool
See the formula , repo , and docs

Graphviz 📊🖋️

An open-source graph visualization software, capable of representing structural information as diagrams of abstract graphs and networks.

Install with brew install graphviz
See the formula , repo , and docs

HiddenBar 📏🖥️

A lightweight tool to hide menu bar icons and declutter your Mac’s interface.

Install with brew install --cask hiddenbar
See the formula and repo

JQ 📄🔍

A lightweight and flexible command-line JSON processor, enabling data extraction, transformation, and manipulation of JSON data.

Install with brew install jq
See the formula , repo , and docs

Karabiner-Elements ⌨️🔧

A powerful keyboard customizer allowing you to remap keys, create shortcuts, and improve typing efficiency on your Mac.

Install with brew install --cask karabiner-elements
See the formula , repo , and docs

KeepingYouAwake ☕💻

A utility to prevent your Mac from going to sleep or turning off the display when you need it to stay active.

Install with brew install --cask keepingyouawake
See the formula and repo

Obsidian 📝🔗

A powerful note-taking and knowledge management application that uses plain text files with Markdown support.

Install with brew install --cask obsidian
See the formula , repo , and docs

Raycast ⚡🖱️

A productivity tool that allows you to control your Mac using powerful and customizable command-based actions.

Install with brew install --cask raycast
See the formula , repo , and docs

Rectangle 🖼️⌨️

A window management tool to easily resize and position windows on your Mac using keyboard shortcuts or snap-to-edge functionality.

Install with brew install --cask rectangle
See the formula , repo , and docs

iStat Menus 📊🌡️

A comprehensive system monitor providing detailed information about your Mac’s performance through customizable menu bar icons.

Install with brew install --cask istat-menus
See the formula

3. 📣 Communication #

Microsoft Teams 📞📈

A collaboration and communication platform for businesses, integrating chat, meetings, file sharing, and more.

Install with brew install --cask microsoft-teams
See the formula , repo , and docs

Signal 🔐💬

A secure and private messaging app with end-to-end encryption, supporting voice and video calls.

Install with brew install --cask signal
See the formula , repo , and docs

Skype 📱🌍

A widely used communication tool for voice and video calls, instant messaging, and file sharing.

Install with brew install --cask skype
See the formula , repo , and docs

Telegram 🚀🔒

A cloud-based messaging platform with a focus on speed and security, supporting large groups and file sharing.

Install with brew install --cask telegram
See the formula , repo , and docs

Zoom 📹🔗

A popular video conferencing tool for virtual meetings, webinars, and collaboration.

Install with brew install --cask zoom
See the formula , repo , and docs

4. 💻 Development #

Airflow 🌬️📊

The ultimate way to watch your videos on Chromecast, Apple TV and AirPlay 2 enabled TVs.

Install with brew install --cask airflow
See the formula

Autossh 🔗🔐

A tool for automatically starting and maintaining SSH connections.

Install with brew install autossh
See the formula , repo , and docs

Azure CLI ☁️🔧

A command-line tool for managing Azure resources.

Install with brew install azure-cli
See the formula , repo , and docs

Bat 🦇📄

A cat command clone with syntax highlighting and Git integration.

Install with brew install bat
See the formula , repo , and docs

Chromedriver 🌐🚦

A WebDriver for running web tests with Chrome.

Install with brew install --cask chromedriver
See the formula , repo , and docs

Docker 🐳📦

A platform for developing, shipping, and running containerized applications.

Install with brew install --cask docker
See the formula , repo , and docs

Git Credential Manager Core 🧑‍💻🔑

A cross-platform credential helper for Git for HTTPS authentication.

Install with brew install microsoft/git/git-credential-manager-core
See the repo

Git Extras ➕🔧

Extra utilities and scripts for Git.

Install with brew install git-extras
See the formula , repo , and docs

Git LFS 🗄️🔗

A Git extension for versioning large files.

Install with brew install git-lfs
See the formula , repo , and docs

Git Secret 🤫🔐

A tool for storing sensitive data in Git repositories.

Install with brew install git-secret
See the formula , repo , and docs

Git 🧑‍💻🔄

A widely used distributed version control system.

Install with brew install git
See the formula , repo , and docs

Go 🏃‍♂️🔤

An open-source programming language designed for simplicity and concurrency.

Install with brew install go
See the formula , repo , and docs

Hugo 🌐🛠️

A fast and flexible static site generator.

Install with brew install hugo
See the formula , repo , and docs

Java ☕💻

A popular programming language and development platform.

Install with brew install openjdk
See the formula , repo , and docs

Micro ✍️🖥️

A modern and intuitive terminal-based text editor.

Install with brew install micro
See the formula , repo , and docs

Nano 📝🔍

A simple and easy-to-use terminal text editor.

Install with brew install nano
See the formula , repo , and docs

Rbenv 💎🔧

A Ruby version management tool.

Install with brew install rbenv
See the formula , repo , and docs

Ruby 💎💻

A dynamic, open-source programming language focused on simplicity and productivity.

Install with brew install ruby
See the formula , repo , and docs

Rustup-Init 🦀🛠️

A toolchain installer for the Rust programming language.

Install with brew install rustup-init
See the formula , repo , and docs

Terraform 🌍🛠️

An infrastructure as code software tool for managing cloud resources.

Install with brew install terraform
See the formula , repo , and docs

Visual Studio Code 💻✏️

A powerful and extensible code editor with integrated Git and debugging support.

Install with brew install --cask visual-studio-code
See the formula , repo , and docs

5. 🎨 Graphics and Design #

Gifsicle 🎞️🛠️

A command-line tool for creating, editing, and optimizing GIF animations and images.

Install with brew install gifsicle
See the formula , repo , and docs

ImageMagick 🖼️🛠️

A powerful command-line tool for creating, editing, and converting bitmap images, supporting a wide range of image formats.

Install with brew install imagemagick
See the formula , repo , and docs

Inkscape ✏️🖼️

A professional vector graphics editor that supports various file formats, offering a powerful set of drawing tools for graphic design.

Install with brew install --cask inkscape
See the formula , repo , and docs

OBS (Open Broadcaster Software) 🎮🎥

A powerful and customizable software for live streaming and screen recording, widely used by content creators and gamers.

Install with brew install --cask obs
See the formula , repo , and docs

6. 🖥️ Terminal and Shell #

Brew-Cask-Completion 🍺📝

Shell completion for the Homebrew-Cask command, providing helpful suggestions and autocompletion.

Install with brew install brew-cask-completion
See the formula

GitHub CLI (gh) 🐙💻

A command-line tool for managing GitHub repositories, issues, pull requests, and more, directly from the terminal.

Install with brew install gh
See the formula , repo , and docs

Htop 📊🖥️

An interactive process viewer for Unix systems, providing a real-time, color-coded view of system resources and processes.

Install with brew install htop
See the formula , repo , and docs

Starship 🚀⭐

A minimal, fast, and customizable shell prompt for any shell.

Install with brew install starship
See the formula , repo , and docs

Tmux 📺🔀

A terminal multiplexer for managing multiple terminal sessions within a single window.

Install with brew install tmux
See the formula , repo , and docs

XQuartz 🎨🖥️

An open-source X Window System implementation for macOS that allows running X11 applications, enabling compatibility with many Unix programs.

Install with brew install --cask xquartz
See the formula , repo , and docs

Zsh 🐚🚀

An interactive and highly extensible Unix shell.

Install with brew install zsh
See the formula , repo , and docs

iTerm2 🖥️🎛️

A highly customizable and powerful terminal emulator for macOS.

Install with brew install --cask iterm2
See the formula , repo , and docs

7. 🅰️ Fonts #

Font Fira Code 📝🔠

A monospaced font with programming ligatures, designed for a modern coding experience. Enhances readability and aesthetics in code editors.

Install with brew install --cask homebrew/cask-fonts/font-fira-code
See the repo and docs

8. 📂 File Management and Utilities #

BalenaEtcher 💾🚀

A user-friendly tool for flashing OS images onto SD cards and USB drives, simplifying the creation of bootable media.

Install with brew install --cask balenaetcher
See the formula , repo , and docs

Cakebrew 🍰🍺

A GUI for managing Homebrew packages, providing an easy way to search, install, and update software.

Install with brew install --cask cakebrew
See the formula , repo , and docs

Cryptomator 🔒☁️

An open-source encryption solution for cloud storage services, offering transparent, client-side encryption for data security.

Install with brew install --cask cryptomator
See the formula , repo , and docs

DB Browser for SQLite 🗃️🔍

A high-quality, visual tool to create, design, and edit SQLite database files, streamlining database management.

Install with brew install --cask db-browser-for-sqlite
See the formula , repo , and docs

Disk Inventory X 💽📊

A disk usage utility for macOS that displays folder and file sizes in a visual treemap, enabling quick identification of large files.

Install with brew install --cask disk-inventory-x
See the formula , repo , and docs

Dropbox ☁️📁

A popular cloud storage service that seamlessly synchronizes files across devices, making file sharing and collaboration easy.

Install with brew install --cask dropbox
See the formula , repo , and docs

MPV 🎞️🎧

A free, open-source, and cross-platform media player with minimalistic design, supporting a wide range of media formats.

Install with brew install --cask mpv
See the formula , repo , and docs

Mounty 🗻💽

A user-friendly tool for mounting and writing to NTFS drives on macOS, providing seamless read/write access.

Install with brew install --cask mounty
See the formula and repo

Rclone 🔄☁️

A command-line program to manage files on various cloud storage services, supporting synchronization, copying, and more.

Install with brew install rclone
See the formula , repo , and docs

Rsync 🔄📁

A powerful file transfer utility that uses delta encoding and compression to minimize data transfer, optimizing file synchronization.

Install with brew install rsync
See the formula , repo , and docs

SSH-Copy-ID 🔑🔗

A utility to install your public key on a remote machine’s authorized_keys, simplifying the setup of passwordless SSH connections.

Install with brew install ssh-copy-id
See the formula , repo , and docs

Syncthing ⚙️☁️

A decentralized, open-source file synchronization tool that securely shares and synchronizes files between devices without relying on cloud services.

Install with brew install --cask syncthing
See the formula , repo , and docs

Universal Media Server 📺🌐

A versatile media server that supports various devices and streaming protocols, allowing you to stream your media files across your home network.

Install with brew install --cask universal-media-server
See the formula , repo , and docs

Wget 🌐⬇️

A command-line utility for downloading files from the internet, supporting HTTP, HTTPS, and FTP protocols.

Install with brew install wget
See the formula , repo , and docs

9. 🔒 Security and Privacy #

Avast Security 🛡️🐜

A comprehensive antivirus and security suite, offering protection against various threats, as well as VPN and cleanup features.

Install with brew install --cask avast-security
See the formula

GnuPG (GPG) 🔐🔑

A complete and free implementation of the OpenPGP standard, providing encryption, signing, and key management capabilities.

Install with brew install gnupg
See the formula , repo , and docs

Keychain 🔑🔗

A tool for managing ssh-agent and GnuPG agent, designed to make key management easier and more convenient.

Install with brew install keychain
See the formula , repo , and docs

LuLu 🚦🔥

A lightweight, open-source firewall for macOS, offering control over outgoing connections and protecting against unauthorized access.

Install with brew install --cask lulu
See the formula , repo , and docs

NordVPN 🌐🔒

A popular VPN service providing a secure and encrypted connection, allowing access to geo-restricted content and protecting your privacy.

Install with brew install --cask nordvpn
See the formula , repo , and docs

ProtonMail Bridge 📧🔐

A desktop application enabling the use of ProtonMail with your preferred email client, ensuring end-to-end encryption and privacy.

Install with brew install --cask protonmail-bridge
See the formula , repo , and docs

Tor Browser 🕵️‍♀️🌐

A privacy-focused browser that routes your traffic through the Tor network, ensuring anonymity and access to hidden services on the dark web.

Install with brew install --cask tor-browser
See the formula , repo , and docs

Tunnelblick 🚇🔗

A free, open-source VPN client for macOS, providing an easy-to-use interface for connecting to OpenVPN servers.

Install with brew install --cask tunnelblick
See the formula , repo , and docs

10. 🎥 Multimedia #

HandBrake 🎞️🔧

A versatile video converter and transcoder, supporting a wide range of formats and offering advanced customization options.

Install with brew install --cask handbrake
See the formula , repo , and docs

LICEcap 🖥️🎥

A lightweight screen capture tool, allowing you to create animated GIFs directly from your desktop.

Install with brew install --cask licecap
See the formula , repo , and docs

MusicBrainz Picard 🎵🔖

An open-source music tagger, using the MusicBrainz database to automatically update and organize your audio files’ metadata.

Install with brew install --cask musicbrainz-picard
See the formula , repo , and docs

Spotify 🎧🎶

A popular music streaming service, offering access to millions of songs, podcasts, and personalized playlists with a free or premium account.

Install with brew install --cask spotify
See the formula , repo , and docs

Steam 🎮🌐

A digital distribution platform for purchasing and managing video games, providing a vast library of titles and social features.

Install with brew install --cask steam
See the formula , repo , and docs

VLC 📺🔊

A versatile and open-source media player, supporting a wide range of audio and video formats, as well as streaming and conversion capabilities.

Install with brew install --cask vlc
See the formula , repo , and docs

WebTorrent 🌐⚡

A user-friendly torrent client that runs directly in your browser, enabling streaming of torrent files without the need for a separate application.

Install with brew install --cask webtorrent
See the formula , repo , and docs

eqMac 🎚️🎶

An open-source audio equalizer for macOS, enhancing your listening experience with customizable presets and manual adjustments.

Install with brew install --cask eqmac
See the formula , repo , and docs

11. 📄 Office and Document Management #

Adobe Creative Cloud 🎨🖥️

A suite of creative applications for graphic design, video editing, web development, and more, including Photoshop, Illustrator, and Premiere Pro.

Install with brew install --cask adobe-creative-cloud
See the formula , repo , and docs

Adobe Digital Editions 📚🔖

An ebook reader and manager, supporting various formats and DRM-protected files, as well as syncing across devices.

Install with brew install --cask adobe-digital-editions
See the formula , repo , and docs

Calibre 📚🔧

An open-source ebook management tool, offering format conversion, syncing, and organization features, as well as a built-in reader.

Install with brew install --cask calibre
See the formula , repo , and docs

FileBot 📁🔍

A media file organization tool, simplifying the renaming and sorting of TV shows, movies, and music files.

Install with brew install --cask filebot
See the formula , repo , and docs

JabRef 📖🔗

An open-source reference manager, enabling the organization and citation of scientific publications in BibTeX and other formats.

Install with brew install --cask jabref
See the formula , repo , and docs

LyX 📄🎓

A document processor that combines the power of LaTeX with a user-friendly graphical interface, simplifying the creation of professional-looking documents.

Install with brew install --cask lyx
See the formula , repo , and docs

MacTeX 📚🔣

A comprehensive TeX distribution for macOS, including LaTeX, various utilities, and documentation.

Install with brew install --cask mactex
See the formula , repo , and docs

Mactracker 🍎💾

A comprehensive database of Apple hardware and software, providing detailed specifications, history, and support information.

Install with brew install --cask mactracker
See the formula , repo , and docs

Mendeley 📚🔗

A reference manager and academic social network, simplifying the organization, annotation, and citation of research papers.

Install with brew install --cask mendeley
See the formula , repo , and docs

Microsoft Office 📝💼

A suite of productivity applications, including Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook, designed for creating, editing, and managing documents.

Install with brew install --cask microsoft-office
See the formula , repo , and docs

OnyX ⚙️🖥️

A multifunctional utility for macOS, offering maintenance, optimization, and personalization features, as well as advanced options for power users.

Install with brew install --cask onyx
See the formula , repo , and docs

12. 📈 Finance and Cryptocurrency #

Cointop 💹📈

A command-line interface for tracking cryptocurrency market data, with an interactive and customizable dashboard.

Install with brew install cointop
See the formula , repo , and docs

Exodus 💰🔒

A user-friendly cryptocurrency wallet, supporting a wide range of assets, exchange features, and portfolio management.

Install with brew install --cask exodus
See the formula , repo , and docs

13. 🎲 Miscellaneous #

Ext4Fuse 🐧💽

A macOS filesystem extension enabling read-only support for the ext4 file system, commonly used on Linux systems.

Install with brew install gromgit/fuse/ext4fuse-mac
See the repo and docs

Git LaTeXdiff 📄🔍

A command-line tool for generating diff files for LaTeX documents, simplifying the tracking of changes and collaboration on LaTeX projects.

Install with brew install homebrew/tex/git-latexdiff
See the repo and docs

GitHub 🧑‍💻🔄

The official GitHub desktop client, simplifying repository management, version control, and collaboration on macOS.

Install with brew install --cask github
See the formula , repo , and docs

MacFuse 💽🔗

A macOS filesystem extension enabling the use of non-native filesystems, offering compatibility with a wide range of formats.

Install with brew install --cask macfuse
See the formula , repo , and docs

Microsoft Azure Storage Explorer ☁️🗃️

A graphical tool for managing Azure Blob Storage, offering convenient access, organization, and management of your cloud storage.

Install with brew install --cask microsoft-azure-storage-explorer
See the formula , repo , and docs

MonitorControl 🖥️🎚️

A utility for controlling your external monitor’s settings, such as brightness and volume, directly from your macOS menu bar.

Install with brew install --cask monitorcontrol
See the formula , repo , and docs

NTFS-3G 🖥️🔗

A macOS filesystem extension providing read-write support for the NTFS file system, commonly used on Windows systems.

Install with brew install gromgit/fuse/ntfs-3g-mac
See the repo and docs

QLVideo 🎥👀

A QuickLook plugin for macOS, providing thumbnail previews and playback of various video formats directly in Finder.

Install with brew install --cask qlvideo
See the formula , repo , and docs

Rotki 💹🔐

An open-source portfolio tracking and tax reporting tool for cryptocurrencies, offering extensive customization and privacy options.

Install with brew install --cask rotki
See the formula , repo , and docs

SABnzbd 🌐🗞️

A binary newsreader for Usenet, offering automation features, a web interface, and compatibility with popular download management tools.

Install with brew install --cask sabnzbd
See the formula , repo , and docs

SSHFS 💻🔗

A macOS filesystem extension enabling mounting of remote filesystems via SSH, providing secure and convenient access to remote files.

Install with brew install gromgit/fuse/sshfs-mac
See the repo and docs

SelfControl 🚫🕒

A productivity tool for macOS, allowing you to block access to distracting websites and applications for a set period of time.

Install with brew install --cask selfcontrol
See the formula , repo , and docs

Sloth 🐌💻

A macOS utility for displaying open files and network connections, offering insights into system resource usage and potential bottlenecks.

Install with brew install --cask sloth
See the formula , repo , and docs

SwitchResX 🖥️🔍

A display resolution management tool for macOS, enabling custom resolutions, aspect ratios, and refresh rates for your monitor.

Install with brew install --cask switchresx
See the formula , repo , and docs

TeamViewer 🌐💻

A remote desktop and collaboration tool, offering screen sharing, file transfer, and remote control capabilities for personal and professional use.

Install with brew install --cask teamviewer
See the formula , repo , and docs

Unclack 🎤🔇

A utility for macOS that automatically mutes your microphone while you type, preventing unwanted noise during conference calls and voice recordings.

Install with brew install --cask unclack
See the formula , repo , and docs

f.lux 🌞🌛

A screen color temperature adjustment tool, reducing eye strain and promoting healthy sleep patterns by adapting your display to the time of day.

Install with brew install --cask flux
See the formula , repo , and docs

pipx 🐍📦

A package manager for installing and running Python applications in isolated environments, ensuring clean and conflict-free installations.

Install with brew install pipx
See the formula , repo , and docs

qBittorrent ⚡📁

A free and open-source torrent client, featuring a clean interface, powerful search capabilities, and minimal resource usage.

Install with brew install --cask qbittorrent
See the formula , repo , and docs

yq 📄🔧

A command-line tool for parsing and manipulating YAML files, offering powerful filtering and editing capabilities.

Install with brew install yq
See the formula , repo , and docs

3. Increase `sudo` Password Timeout #

To increase the sudo password timeout, follow the instructions provided in this StackExchange answer.

4. oh-my-zsh #

oh-my-zsh is a popular framework for managing your Zsh configuration. Follow the download instructions provided in the link, or use the dotfiles folder if you have it.

5. Set Your Mac Host/Computer Name #

To set a custom host or computer name for your Mac, open a terminal and run the following commands:

NAME="your-custom-name"
sudo scutil --set HostName $NAME
sudo scutil --set LocalHostName $NAME
sudo scutil --set ComputerName $NAME
dscacheutil -flushcache

6. Quick Dock Hiding #

For a cleaner desktop experience, follow this StackExchange answer to enable quick dock hiding.

7. iTerm and VS Code Font #

The Fira Code font is a popular choice for developers. To set it as the default font for iTerm and Visual Studio Code:

iTerm should be set by Profiles.json
Follow the VS Code instructions

Conclusion #

After completing these steps, restart your Mac. You now have a fully customized and functional MacOS environment, ready for productivity and creativity. Enjoy your freshly set-up MacOS!

My VS Code setup: extensions and shortcuts ⚡

Sun, 16 Apr 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Visual Studio Code, or VSCode, has rapidly become one of the most popular code editors available today, and for good reason. With a vast amount of development activity behind it, VSCode is a powerful and extensible platform that allows users to customize it to their needs through a wide variety of extensions. As a long-time Sublime Text user, I was initially skeptical about making the switch due to concerns about performance. However, as I spent more time using VSCode, I became convinced of its many benefits and have since made it my go-to editor for all my development needs, particularly for Python.

In this blog post, I will share my personal setup for turbocharging Python development in VSCode, including my favorite extensions and most-used keystrokes. By tailoring your editor to your specific requirements and preferences, you can maximize productivity and minimize keystrokes, making your development experience as smooth and efficient as possible.

Table of contents

My most common Shortcuts #

Personally, I use the Sublime Keymap extension to add Sublime Text keybindings to VSCode.

It is a valuable extension for those who are transitioning from Sublime Text to Visual Studio Code or simply prefer Sublime Text’s keybindings. This extension replicates Sublime Text’s keyboard shortcuts in VSCode, allowing you to maintain your productivity and muscle memory.

Here are my commonly used shortcuts when using the Sublime Keymap extension and the default VSCode keybindings (if missing both are the same):

Keybinding (Sublime)	Keybinding (VS Code)	Description
Command + Shift + P (Mac) / Ctrl + Shift + P (Windows)	same	Open the command palette
Command + P (Mac) / Ctrl + P (Windows)	same	Quick file navigation
Command + D (Mac) / Ctrl + D (Windows)	same	Select the next occurrence of the current word
Command + U (Mac) / Ctrl + U (Windows)	same	Undo the last “select next word” operation
Alt + up/down arrow	same	Move the selected lines up or down
Alt + Shift + up/down arrows	same	Duplicate the selected lines above or below
Command + Shift + L (Mac) / Ctrl + Shift + L (Windows)	Shift + Alt + L	Place a cursor at the end of all selected lines
Control + - (minus)	same	Navigate to the previous location in the editor
Command + T (Mac) / Ctrl + T (Windows)	Command + P (Mac) / Control + P (Windows)	Browse files in the workspace
Command + R (Mac) / Ctrl + R (Windows)	Command + Shift + O (Mac) / Ctrl + Shift + O (Windows)	Open the command palette and search for definitions in the file (bonus, add a `:`, to get `@:` to group by functions, methods, variables, etc.)
Command + B (Mac) / Ctrl + B (Windows)	same	Toggle the visibility of the sidebar (explorer, search, etc.)
Command + Shift + F (Mac) / Ctrl + Shift + F (Windows)	same	Search across all files in your workspace
Command + Shift + E (Mac) / Ctrl + Shift + E (Windows)	same	Open the file explorer
Control + Space	same	Open the autocomplete menu
Command + Mouse click or F12	same	Go to the definition of the selected word
Command + I	same	Open GitHub Copilot prompt inline
Command + Shift + I	same	Open GitHub Copilot prompt in sidebar
Shift + Alt + F	same	Autoformat
Command + Control + G	Command + Shift + L (Mac) / Ctrl + Shift + L (Windows)	Select all occurrences of current word
F2	same	Rename symbol
Ctrl + `	same	Open the integrated terminal
Alt + Z	same	Toggle word wrap

My favorite extensions #

I have ranked my top 8 extensions, which I would recommend to anyone who is looking to improve their productivity and efficiency in VSCode.

1. GitHub Copilot #

GitHub Copilot is an AI-powered code completion extension that provides seamless integration with the Copilot service, helping you write code faster and smarter.

Use code --install-extension GitHub.copilot to install the GitHub Copilot extension (docs)

2. GitLens #

GitLens supercharges the built-in Git support in VSCode, providing useful insights into your code history and changes, including advanced blame annotations, code lens, and more.

Use code --install-extension eamodio.gitlens to install the GitLens extension (docs)

3. Python and Pylance #

These extensions offer comprehensive support for Python development, with features like IntelliSense, linting, debugging, and code navigation. Pylance enhances Python support with improved code completion, type checking, and language features.

Use code --install-extension ms-python.python to install the Python extension (docs)
Use code --install-extension ms-python.vscode-pylance to install the Pylance extension (docs)

4. Jupyter #

The Jupyter extensions enable you to work with Jupyter Notebooks in VSCode, with support for running cells, debugging, and more. Jupyter Keymap adds customizable keyboard shortcuts for Jupyter commands.

Use code --install-extension ms-toolsai.jupyter to install the Jupyter extension (docs)

5. Sublime Keybindings #

Sublime Keybindings adds keybindings from Sublime Text to VSCode, making it easier for developers familiar with Sublime Text to transition to VSCode.

Use code --install-extension ms-vscode.sublime-keybindings to install the Sublime Keybindings extension (docs)

6. Remote Containers, SSH, and Remote Extension Pack #

These extensions provide support for working with remote development environments in VSCode, such as developing inside a container or connecting to remote machines via SSH. The Extension Pack bundles all the remote development extensions for convenience.

Use code --install-extension ms-vscode-remote.remote-ssh-edit to install the Remote SSH Edit extension (docs)
Use code --install-extension ms-vscode-remote.vscode-remote-extensionpack to install the Remote Extension Pack (docs)
Use code --install-extension ms-vscode.remote-explorer to install the Remote Explorer extension (docs)
Use code --install-extension ms-vscode.remote-repositories to install the Remote Repositories extension (docs)

7. Indent Rainbow #

Indent Rainbow is a VSCode extension that colorizes indentation levels in your code, making it easier to visualize and navigate complex code structures.

Use code --install-extension oderwat.indent-rainbow to install the Indent Rainbow extension (docs)

8. Code Spell Checker #

Code Spell Checker is a helpful extension that checks your code and comments for spelling errors, helping you maintain clean and professional code.

Use code --install-extension streetsidesoftware.code-spell-checker to install the Code Spell Checker extension (docs)

Ruff #

Ruff is a Visual Studio Code extension that provides support for the Ruff linter, an extremely fast Python linter written in Rust. It offers numerous features such as built-in caching, autofix support, and a comprehensive set of built-in rules. Ruff aims to replace multiple tools like Flake8, isort, pydocstyle, yesqa, eradicate, pyupgrade, and autoflake, while executing much faster than any individual tool.

Use code --install-extension charliermarsh.ruff to install the Ruff extension (docs)

GitHub Codespaces, RemoteHub, and Pull Request #

These GitHub extensions provide seamless integration with various GitHub services, including Codespaces (cloud-based development environments), RemoteHub (browse remote repositories), and Pull Request management.

Use code --install-extension GitHub.codespaces to install the GitHub Codespaces extension (docs)
Use code --install-extension GitHub.remotehub to install the GitHub RemoteHub extension (docs)
Use code --install-extension GitHub.vscode-pull-request-github to install the GitHub Pull Request extension (docs)

Rainbow CSV #

Rainbow CSV adds syntax highlighting for CSV and TSV files in VSCode, making it easier to read and analyze data by color-coding columns.

Use code --install-extension mechatroner.rainbow-csv to install the Rainbow CSV extension (docs)

Better Comments #

Better Comments is a VSCode extension that helps improve the readability of your code comments by adding color and style to different types of comments, such as TODOs, highlights, questions, and alerts.

Use code --install-extension aaron-bond.better-comments to install the Better Comments extension (docs)

Markdown Preview Enhanced #

Markdown Preview Enhanced is a feature-rich extension that provides a real-time preview of your Markdown files, supporting various Markdown flavors, interactive diagrams, and more.

Use code --install-extension shd101wyy.markdown-preview-enhanced to install the Markdown Preview Enhanced extension (docs)

Markdown All in One #

Markdown All in One is a comprehensive extension that provides a range of features for working with Markdown files in VSCode, including syntax highlighting, auto-completion, table of contents, and more.

Use code --install-extension yzhang.markdown-all-in-one to install the Markdown All in One extension (docs)

WakaTime #

WakaTime is an open source VS Code plugin for metrics, insights, and time tracking automatically generated from your programming activity. This service will keep a summary of how much time you spend in which project and which programming language.

Use code --install-extension WakaTime.vscode-wakatime to install the WakaTime extension (docs)

Other extensions I use #

The following extensions are not as essential as the ones listed above, but I still find them useful for various tasks.

LaTeX Workshop #

LaTeX Workshop is a comprehensive extension for working with LaTeX documents in VSCode, featuring syntax highlighting, building and previewing, IntelliSense, and more.

Use code --install-extension James-Yu.latex-workshop to install the LaTeX Workshop extension (docs)

Visual Studio Live Share is a real-time collaboration extension that allows you to share your workspace with others, enabling pair programming, code reviews, and collaborative debugging.

Use code --install-extension ms-vsliveshare.vsliveshare to install the Live Share extension (docs)

Azure Account and Repos #

These extensions offer a range of Azure-related functionality, including managing your Azure account, working with Azure Repos, exploring remote resources, and browsing remote Git repositories.

Use code --install-extension ms-vscode.azure-account to install the Azure Account extension (docs)
Use code --install-extension ms-vscode.azure-repos to install the Azure Repos extension (docs)

CodeSnap #

CodeSnap is a handy extension for creating beautiful code screenshots directly from your editor, making it easier to share code snippets on social media, blog posts, or documentation.

Use code --install-extension adpyke.codesnap to install the CodeSnap extension (docs)

Micromamba #

The Micromamba extension for VSCode integrates the Micromamba package manager, making it easier to manage Conda environments and packages within the editor.

Use code --install-extension corker.vscode-micromamba to install the Micromamba extension (docs)

Markdownlint #

Markdownlint is a VSCode extension that provides linting and style-checking for Markdown files, ensuring consistent and clean Markdown content.

Use code --install-extension DavidAnson.vscode-markdownlint to install the Markdownlint extension (docs)

Prettier #

Prettier is a powerful code formatter that supports multiple languages, including JavaScript, TypeScript, HTML, CSS, and more. It enforces a consistent code style across your project.

Use code --install-extension esbenp.prettier-vscode to install the Prettier extension (docs)

Code Runner #

Code Runner is a versatile extension that enables you to quickly run code snippets or whole files for multiple programming languages within VSCode, without the need to switch to an external terminal.

Use code --install-extension formulahendry.code-runner to install the Code Runner extension (docs)

Go #

The Go extension by the Go team provides rich language support for the Go programming language, with features like IntelliSense, debugging, linting, and code navigation.

Use code --install-extension golang.go to install the Go extension (docs)

Home Assistant #

The Home Assistant extension for VSCode provides integration with Home Assistant configuration files, offering syntax highlighting, auto-completion, and validation.

Use code --install-extension keesschollaart.vscode-home-assistant to install the Home Assistant extension (docs)

Azure Pipelines, Resource Groups, Storage, and Terraform #

These Microsoft Azure extensions provide powerful integrations with various Azure services, allowing you to manage pipelines, resource groups, storage, and Terraform configurations directly within VSCode.

Use code --install-extension ms-azure-devops.azure-pipelines to install the Azure Pipelines extension (docs)
Use code --install-extension ms-azuretools.vscode-azureresourcegroups to install the Azure Resource Groups extension (docs)
Use code --install-extension ms-azuretools.vscode-azurestorage to install the Azure Storage extension (docs)
Use code --install-extension ms-azuretools.vscode-azureterraform to install the Azure Terraform extension (docs)

Docker #

The Docker extension adds rich support for working with Docker containers and images in VSCode, including building, managing, and deploying containerized applications.

Use code --install-extension ms-azuretools.vscode-docker to install the Docker extension (docs)

AutoDocstring #

AutoDocstring is a helpful extension that automatically generates docstrings for Python functions and classes, following popular docstring formats like Google, NumPy, and reStructuredText.

Use code --install-extension njpwerner.autodocstring to install the AutoDocstring extension (docs)

XML and YAML #

These extensions by Red Hat provide rich language support for XML and YAML, including syntax highlighting, validation, code navigation, and more.

Use code --install-extension redhat.vscode-xml to install the XML extension (docs)
Use code --install-extension redhat.vscode-yaml to install the YAML extension (docs)

Rust Analyzer #

Rust Analyzer is a powerful language server for the Rust programming language, offering features like syntax highlighting, code navigation, and auto-completion.

Use code --install-extension rust-lang.rust-analyzer to install the Rust Analyzer extension (docs)

Even Better TOML #

Even Better TOML is a VSCode extension that provides syntax highlighting, validation, and auto-completion for TOML (Tom’s Obvious, Minimal Language) configuration files.

Terrastruct #

Terrastruct is a VSCode extension that helps you visualize your Terraform dependency graphs as interactive diagrams, making it easier to understand complex infrastructure-as-code projects.

Use code --install-extension Terrastruct.d2 to install the Terrastruct extension (docs)

PDF #

The PDF extension allows you to view and manage PDF files directly within VSCode, with support for zooming, rotating, and searching text.

Use code --install-extension tomoki1207.pdf to install the PDF extension (docs)

LTeX #

LTeX is a grammar and spell checker extension for LaTeX, Markdown, and other markup languages, with support for multiple languages and customizable rules.

Use code --install-extension valentjn.vscode-ltex to install the LTeX extension (docs)

IntelliCode API Usage Examples and IntelliCode #

These extensions by the Visual Studio Expt Team provide AI-powered code completion and code examples, helping you write code faster and with fewer errors.

Use code --install-extension VisualStudioExptTeam.intellicode-api-usage-examples to install the IntelliCode API Usage Examples extension (docs)
Use code --install-extension VisualStudioExptTeam.vscodeintellicode to install the IntelliCode extension (docs)

vscode-icons #

vscode-icons is a popular extension that adds file icons to VSCode, making it easier to identify file types in the file explorer.

Use code --install-extension vscode-icons-team.vscode-icons to install the vscode-icons extension (docs)

Working faster in the terminal 🥷

Sat, 15 Apr 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Welcome to a world of terminal productivity! When helping others with programming problems on their computer, I often find myself in their terminal, and feel like walking through sand. When I show how awesome of an experience it can be, I often find myself repeating the same suggestions over and over again. So, I decided to write this guide to help others set up their terminal in a similar fashion. Let’s explore the wonders of zsh, oh-my-zsh, keychain, starship, autoenv, z, zsh-autosuggestions, and other useful tools!

Table of contents

💾 Dotfiles: Version Control Your Configuration Files #

Configuration files are the key to a personalized terminal experience. Keeping a dotfiles folder where you store and version control your config files ensures they’re safe, portable, and easily shared.

By keeping your .bashrc, .zshrc, and other configuration files under version control, you can:

Track changes and easily revert to previous versions if something breaks.
Sync your settings across multiple machines, recreating your setup anywhere.
Share your configurations with others, helping them improve their own terminal experience.

A powerful approach is to not only track your configuration files but also to include plugins and tools as git submodules in your dotfiles repository. This keeps everything organized and makes it easy to update or share your complete setup.

Here’s an example of submodules I track in my dotfiles repository:

[submodule "configs/zsh/oh-my-zsh"]
	path = submodules/oh-my-zsh
	url = git@github.com:robbyrussell/oh-my-zsh.git
[submodule "configs/zsh/zsh-syntax-highlighting"]
	path = submodules/zsh-syntax-highlighting
	url = git@github.com:zsh-users/zsh-syntax-highlighting.git
[submodule "configs/zsh/zsh-autosuggestions"]
	path = submodules/zsh-autosuggestions
	url = git@github.com:zsh-users/zsh-autosuggestions.git
[submodule "submodules/keychain"]
	path = submodules/keychain
	url = git@github.com:funtoo/keychain.git
[submodule "configs/zsh/k"]
	path = submodules/k
	url = git@github.com:supercrabtree/k.git
[submodule "submodules/.tmux"]
	path = submodules/tmux
	url = https://github.com/gpakosz/.tmux.git
[submodule "configs/zsh/autoenv"]
	path = submodules/autoenv
	url = https://github.com/hyperupcall/autoenv
[submodule "submodules/bypass-paywalls-chrome"]
	path = submodules/bypass-paywalls-chrome
	url = git@github.com:iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-chrome.git
[submodule "submodules/dotbot"]
	path = submodules/dotbot
	url = https://github.com/anishathalye/dotbot
[submodule "dotbot"]
	ignore = dirty
# (... a couple more ...)

To start version controlling your dotfiles, create a new Git repository, add your config files and submodules, then commit and push to a remote repository for safekeeping.

Dotbot is highly recommended for automating the installation of your dotfiles.

🐚 The Power of Zsh and Oh-my-zsh #

The first step toward terminal efficiency is choosing the right shell. Zsh is a powerful, versatile, and user-friendly shell with features that significantly improve the command line experience. Oh-my-zsh adds even more functionality as a framework for managing Zsh configurations. It brings themes, plugins, and functions that make the terminal more powerful and enjoyable to use.

Setting up Zsh and Oh-my-zsh is straightforward:

Install Zsh (check your system’s package manager for instructions).

Install Oh-my-zsh by running:

sh -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ohmyzsh/ohmyzsh/master/tools/install.sh)"

Edit your .zshrc file and add the following lines to customize your plugins and theme:

ZSH_THEME="robbyrussell" # or any other theme you like
plugins=(git z dirhistory history sudo)

🚀 Oh-my-zsh Z Plugin: Jump Around! #

Quick navigation through the file system is essential for productivity. Z is a fantastic utility that lets you jump to directories based on frequency and recency of use. With Z, you can instantly leap to any frequently-used folder without typing the full path.

To set up Z, add the following lines to your .zshrc:

plugins=(... z ...)
source $ZSH/oh-my-zsh.sh

Alternative: zoxide, a more modern and faster version of Z in Rust. Need to try it myself.

⏰ Oh-my-zsh Dirhistory Plugin: Time Travel Through Directories #

The dirhistory plugin makes navigating directories incredibly simple with keyboard shortcuts:

ALT-LEFT: Move back to previously visited directories.
ALT-RIGHT: Undo the effect of ALT-LEFT, returning to the directories you moved back from.
ALT-UP: Move up one level in the directory hierarchy (equivalent to cd ..).
ALT-DOWN: Move into the first directory found in alphabetical order within the current directory.

To set up the Oh-my-zsh dirhistory plugin, add the following lines to your .zshrc:

plugins=(... dirhistory ...)
source $ZSH/oh-my-zsh.sh

This plugin makes directory navigation a breeze, reducing the need for repetitive typing.

🔧 Oh-my-zsh Git Plugin: Turbocharge Your Git Workflow #

For developers who use Git frequently, typing out full commands like git checkout and git commit gets tedious. The git plugin in Oh-my-zsh provides useful aliases that save time and keystrokes. Here are some of the most commonly used aliases:

gco: git checkout - Switch branches or restore working tree files.
gd: git diff - Show changes between the working tree and the index or a tree.
g: git - The git command itself.
gcb: git checkout -b - Create a new branch and switch to it.
gc: git commit --verbose - Create a new commit with a verbose message.
gc!: git commit --verbose --amend - Amend the previous commit with a verbose message.
ga: git add - Add file contents to the index.
gca: git commit --verbose --all - Commit all changes with a verbose message.
gca!: git commit --verbose --all --amend - Amend the previous commit with a verbose message.
gcp: git cherry-pick - Apply the changes introduced by some existing commits.
gst: git status - Show the working tree status.
gp: git push - Update remote refs along with associated objects.
gmom: git merge origin/$(git_main_branch) - Merge changes from the main branch.
grbom: git rebase origin/$(git_main_branch) - Rebase current branch onto the main branch.
gfa: git fetch --all --prune --jobs=10 - Fetch all remote branches and remove any stale remote-tracking references, using 10 parallel jobs.

To set up the Oh-my-zsh git plugin, add the following lines to your .zshrc:

plugins=(... git ...)
source $ZSH/oh-my-zsh.sh

Check out the full list of Git aliases that the Git plugin provides.

🔑 Keychain: SSH Key Management Made Simple #

Keychain is a tool that manages SSH keys, making secure access to remote systems much more convenient. It’s especially useful when working with Git repositories or remote servers via SSH.

With Keychain, you only need to enter your SSH password once after rebooting, and it will remember it for future sessions.

To set up Keychain, clone it to your dotfiles directory:

git clone git@github.com:funtoo/keychain.git ~/dotfiles/keychain

Then add these lines to your .bash_profile:

if [[ `hostname` == 'Linux' ]]; then
 export PATH="$PATH:${HOME}/dotfiles/dotfiles/keychain/"
 if ps -p $SSH_AGENT_PID > /dev/null; then
 echo "ssh-agent is already running"
 else
 eval `keychain --eval --quiet id_ed25519`
 fi
fi
if [[ `uname` == 'Darwin' ]]; then
 eval `keychain --eval --quiet --agents ssh --inherit any-once id_ed25519`
fi

🌌 Starship: A Sleek, Informative Shell Prompt #

Starship is a minimal, blazing-fast, and fully customizable shell prompt that provides essential information at a glance. It shows details about your current environment, such as Git branch, Python virtual environment, and more.

Setting up Starship is simple:

Install it using the appropriate command for your system:
```
curl -fsSL https://starship.rs/install.sh | bash
```
Add the following line to your .bashrc or .zshrc:
```
eval "$(starship init zsh)"
```

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🌍 Autoenv: Smart Environment Management #

When working with multiple projects, each often requires specific environment settings. Autoenv automates the process of activating and deactivating these settings when you enter or leave a directory.

For example, you can create a .env file in your project directory to automatically activate a Python environment:

conda activate myenv

To set up Autoenv:

Clone the repository (or add it to your dotfiles):

git clone git://github.com/hyperupcall/autoenv.git ~/.autoenv

Add the following line to your .zshrc:
```
source ~/.autoenv/activate.sh
```

💡 Zsh-autosuggestions: Command Suggestions as You Type #

Zsh-autosuggestions suggests commands based on your command history as you type. This saves keystrokes and makes repetitive tasks much faster.

To set up Zsh-autosuggestions:

Clone the repository:

git clone https://github.com/zsh-users/zsh-autosuggestions.git $ZSH_CUSTOM/plugins/zsh-autosuggestions

Add the following line to your .zshrc:

source $ZSH_CUSTOM/plugins/zsh-autosuggestions/zsh-autosuggestions.zsh

Alternative: direnv, very similar to autoenv, but seems more widely used. Still need to try it myself.

🦇 Bat: A Supercharged Cat Alternative #

Bat is a modern replacement for the cat command with syntax highlighting, Git integration, and other enhancements that make viewing files in the terminal much more pleasant.

Installing Bat is straightforward with most package managers:

brew install bat # macOS
apt install bat # Ubuntu/Debian

To seamlessly replace cat with bat while maintaining the simple behavior when needed, add this to your .zshrc:

if command -v bat &> /dev/null; then
 alias cat="bat --plain --paging=never"
fi

This alias makes bat behave like cat by default (without line numbers or fancy formatting), but you can still use the bat command directly when you want the enhanced features.

Bat is particularly useful when viewing code files, configuration files, or any text that benefits from syntax highlighting, making it easier to quickly understand the content at a glance.

🧩 Putting it All Together #

With these powerful tools at your disposal, you’re now equipped to make your terminal experience faster, more efficient, and more enjoyable. These tools work together to reduce repetitive typing, simplify complex workflows, and provide helpful information when you need it. Each component adds something valuable to your terminal setup, creating a seamless and productive environment.

Try implementing these tools one by one, and see how they transform your command-line experience. Feel free to reach out if you have questions about any of the tools mentioned. Happy terminal customizing!

Setup | Bas Nijholt

Two years on the Glove80: a split ergonomic, programmable keyboard as a programmer ⌨️

Why I switched #

Split ergonomic keyboards: What makes them different? #

Columnar layout #

Vertical column‑stagger #

Split halves #

Key wells #

Thumb clusters #

Tenting #

Switches #

The first month: Comfort vs. disruption #

What was frustrating #

Practice tools that helped #

Programmable features that make a difference #

Mod-tap: One key, two functions #

Sticky modifiers: Tap instead of hold #

Layers: Multiple keyboards in one #

The “hyper” key shortcut #

What I’d tell my past self #

Where I am now #

What’s next? #

Community and support #

Open-sourcing my dotfiles: a practical, cross-platform terminal setup 🏠

Introduction #

Why Open Source Now? #

Core Ideas & Highlights #

1. Cross-Platform & Shell Agnostic #

2. Modularity for Sanity #

3. Automation via Dotbot #

4. Hassle-Free CLI Tools with dotbins #

5. Sensible SSH Key Management #

6. (macOS) Declarative Setup with Nix-Darwin #

A Note on Alternatives & Design Choices #

A Look Inside: Structure #

Getting Started #

A Note on Secrets #

Conclusion #

Combining Keychain and 1Password CLI for ssh-agent management

Combining Keychain and 1Password CLI for SSH Agent Management #

dotbins: managing binary tools in your dotfiles 🧰

The Modern CLI Tools Problem #

Enter dotbins 🧰 #

How dotbins Works #

My Workflow: A Two-Repository Approach #

Modern Alternatives to My Previous Setup #

Getting Started with dotbins #

Finding New Tools to Add #

Conclusion: The Evolution of My Terminal Setup #

My macOS setup: Homebrew, apps, and defaults 🍏

Introduction #

1. Manual Installations #

2. Homebrew #

1. 🌐 Browsers #

Brave Browser 🛡️🦁

Chrome 🌐💨

Firefox 🔓🦊

2. 🛠️ Productivity Tools #

Bartender 🍸🖥️

BetterTouchTool 👆🛠️

Graphviz 📊🖋️

HiddenBar 📏🖥️

JQ 📄🔍

Karabiner-Elements ⌨️🔧

KeepingYouAwake ☕💻

Obsidian 📝🔗

Raycast ⚡🖱️

Rectangle 🖼️⌨️

iStat Menus 📊🌡️

3. 📣 Communication #

Microsoft Teams 📞📈

Signal 🔐💬

Skype 📱🌍

Telegram 🚀🔒

Zoom 📹🔗

4. 💻 Development #

Airflow 🌬️📊

Autossh 🔗🔐

Azure CLI ☁️🔧

Bat 🦇📄

4. Hassle-Free CLI Tools with `dotbins` #

Enter `dotbins` 🧰 #

How `dotbins` Works #

Getting Started with `dotbins` #