Linux

You don’t need a dotfile manager, you need proper backups.

My own intricate system of 4 git repos to manage dotfiles, bash initialization, cli tools/scripts, and system state.

The last one keeps track of installed packages and "dotfiles" out of the home directory (system config files like /etc/hosts).

My home directory is a git repo with a .gitignore that contains something like

*

!.config/sway

!.config/sway/*

!.config/sway/**/*

I wrote my own. Though it's not just for dot files, it sets up my full environment including installing packages, running scripts, neovim plugins, cloning repos etc. Here's where it's used.

That said it isn't really documented and I only work on it if I need something myself, so I wouldn't recommend it 😂

I just rsync my home dir to a backup and then rsync it to a new machine

dotbot

I wrote my own: doti

I used stow for a while but realized it was lacking in some aspects, especially when trying to manage multiple dotfiles separately. For example, I wanted the dotfiles of each application to be contained in its subfolder and the flexibility to pick and choose the dotfiles of which application to place on different computers/phones.

I checked out chezmoi but thought it was overkill for my needs especially since I was a fan of how simple and straightforward my dotfiles layout was with stow was. So I decided to write my own dotfile manager, doti. It's basically a wrapper/manager for using stow. First time I share it online.

Also here are my dotfiles to give you an idea of how the layout looks. (I transitioned from using Sway with the nord theme and many tui/cli apps to using Gnome and mostly gui apps about a year ago)

I use a Git repo for the files, and a simple Makefile to script the correct paths and optional install steps for them

I still swear by yadm, which you can use just like git.

$ crontab -e

0 1 * * * tar -cvzf ~/dotfiles-$(date +\%Y\%m\%d).tgz ~/.[^.]* >/dev/null 2>&1

Git and stow.

Tried some different things, including a few months on NixOS. Git and stow are as easy as it gets.

I just let my dotfiles fall where they may, but any version control software should be able to do what you need—they're just text files, after all. I'd probably go with mercurial, since that's what I use when I need source control for other purposes (I hate git).

I've used homeshick https://github.com/andsens/homeshick for a few years and it's been running fine. It can load two git repos, one common public repo and one private one for work config.

That seems... Overkill? I just have everything I can't easily replace in nextcloud synced to a local directory. If I were to nuke my home dir or the whole machine it would take less than hour to setup it again including clean reinstall debian with gnome