Questions tagged [dot-files]
A dotfile is a file or directory whose name begins with a dot. These files are typically found in user home directories, contain configuration information and hidden from view on Unix systems.
101
questions
1
vote
1answer
50 views
Are Ubuntu dotfiles compatible with Arch dotfiles?
I'm debating whether I should switch from Windows to Linux and I've decided that if I do, I'll be using Arch Linux (most likely manjaro specifically). Mainly because I don't want to have to deal with:
...
0
votes
3answers
82 views
Can echo be combined to produce a single result of .*/ and */?
The echo command outputs differing results based on the expression passed to it. The working directory is /home/etc
$ echo .*/
/ ../ .cache/ .config/ .gnupg/ .local/ .mozilla/ .ssh/
$ echo ./*
./...
0
votes
0answers
24 views
Difficulty reloading changed shell function
I have a function defined in a file ~/.shell/functions.sh that is loaded by .zshrc with a line:
source ~/.shell/functions.sh
However, when I try to update the function after altering it by doing ...
1
vote
3answers
54 views
link config files
Problem
I'm trying to move my config files from a .dotfiles folder, and link those files to the corresponding config path.
Example
In this example I'm trying
$ ln -s ~/.dotfiles/nvim/init.vim ~/....
0
votes
1answer
61 views
How do I invoke Zsh and skip .zshrc or .zshenv?
How do I invoke Zsh interactively while asking it to not process .zshrc?
asked Oct 19 '19 at 20:54
Amelio Vazquez-Reina
28.9k59 gold badges154 silver badges257 bronze badges
5
votes
2answers
733 views
SSHing into system with ZSH as default shell doesn't run /etc/profile
I'm experiencing a strange behavior on some of our machines atm. At least, it seems strange to me and my colleagues and we didn't find any explanation for it :)
[edit 1]
Next paragraph seems to be ...
6
votes
3answers
3k views
How to apply the changes to my `.zshrc` file after edit?
I just edited the .zshrc file to configure my zsh on FreeBSD.
For example, updating the PATH system variable:
path+=/usr/local/openjdk12/bin
How do I make the changes take effect?
Must I logout ...
0
votes
3answers
102 views
Kind of files which just have extension, like .bashrc or .cshrc
I'm wondering about files that have a name starting with a dot e.g.
.bashrc or .cshrc have distinct feature? (Could we say .bashrc extension?)
Maybe these kind of files are a member of a category?
...
1
vote
2answers
117 views
How to avoid copying “..” while using cp command in terminal? [duplicate]
I am using CentOS7 and when I use command
cp /root/test/.* /root/test1
it also copies .. which copies all the files and folder in the parent directory of the source.
How to avoid copying . and ..?
0
votes
1answer
49 views
Can you hide files and folders on MacOS the same way as Linux?
I'm trying to make a Python script that creates a hidden folder for a specific file I'm creating across any platform.
I'm aware you can do this easily with Linux by placing "." as the beginning of a ...
4
votes
1answer
829 views
Dot in front of file [duplicate]
If there is a file and the filename starts with a dot in front of it. Does that mean that you created the file and you are hiding stuff in it or can the files get created on their own without you ...
3
votes
1answer
136 views
Which files in $HOME defines the user preferences in gnome?
I'm backup/syncing my dotfiles in my $HOME-Directory via git. I don't want to sync everything of course, so I ignore everything via .gitignore and re-add the important files.
*
!.bash*
.*.swp
....
0
votes
1answer
43 views
How do configure ZSH commands substition to not use backticks (`)?
I only want echo $(date) to return the date not the backticked version.
echo $(date) # should return Wed Mar 6 09:50:41 EST 2019
echo `date` # should return `date`
2
votes
1answer
116 views
map ls -a to ls -A
I have tried to made an alias ls -a = ls -A, ending up with:
bash: alias: `ls -a': invalid alias name
I want ls -a without . and ... How can I get that?
0
votes
2answers
170 views
How to tar a directory including dotfiles, but omitting all reference to the directory itself
I want to back up home directories including the usual array of dotfiles, but I do not want the directory itself, or its permissions to be backed up or even mentioned. So, if I have a structure like
...
0
votes
1answer
186 views
Is there a totally empty Bash file I can use (or create) to extend .bashrc and .profile?
I know that by principle, one shouldn't change .bashrc and common changes like creating an alias should better be done in .profile instead.
When I rent a new IaaS system with Bash as main shell, the ...
0
votes
1answer
32 views
Can not edit file symlinked (Permission denied)
I started using dotfiles to sync everything I need to github. But I got some problem when symblink config files from dotfiles/ to ~/
Examples:
$ rm ~/.config/termite/config
$ ln -s ~/dotfiles/...
1
vote
1answer
28 views
Excluding certain files from moving but move hidden ones too
In my deployment script I have such as code to exclude certain files.
shopt -s extglob
mv !(deploy.sh|file1|file2) ~/$public
It works almost well but ignores hidden files so they are not moved. How ...
2
votes
6answers
339 views
How do I match only dotfiles in bash? [duplicate]
rm -rf .* will only not end horribly because rm refuses to delete . and ...
How do I exclude these special directories from a glob pattern?
This is not solved by dotglob since I want to match only ...
0
votes
1answer
85 views
How to save settings for Synaptic (Graphical package manager)?
I have dotfiles where I store the settings from all the programs that I use. I mean files with the extension .conf, .cfg, .rc and etc.
But I cannot find a place where the Synaptic keeps its settings.
...
-2
votes
1answer
105 views
cp -r <Folder Name> .<Folder Name>
I run the command cp -r <Folder Name> .<Folder Name>. It have done something, but I cannot find it.
Example:
cp -r Agent .Agent.old # (There is a dot symbol on the 2nd folder name)
1
vote
2answers
86 views
Remove files/folders that start with “.” [duplicate]
This command:
rm -rf "$HOME/.quicklock/locks/"*
does seem to remove files or folders in the locks directory, which start with "."
how can I remove those files too? Any other filenames that would ...
1
vote
1answer
460 views
How to disable oh-my-zsh features only in PyCharm terminal
When using the shell in PyCharm, I have noticed that when I type quickly, the auto-complete feature will cause characters to be dropped.
Is there a convenient way to start /bin/zsh and cause it to ...
1
vote
2answers
270 views
Setting Vim to use shell syntax for dotfiles?
I am creating multiple files (.school_aliases and .git_aliases) to put my aliases in for organization. However, Vim doesn't highlight syntax for these files automatically like for .bashrc or ....
1
vote
2answers
460 views
Backup only hidden (dot) files with duplicity
I would like to backup config files (hidden, starting with a dot) with duplicity. Only files, no directories. The following command
duplicity --include '/home/foo/.*' --exclude '/home/foo/**' /home/...
0
votes
1answer
825 views
Grouping hidden files and directories with ls
How can ls be flagged to sort .-prefixed hidden directories and files in groups so that its output is sorted as visible directories, hidden directories, visible files, then hidden files?
I currently ...
0
votes
0answers
163 views
Windows 10 ISO content looks odd (“.” directory)
I've downloaded Windows 10 Disc Image from microsoft.com recently. I mounted it using Archive Mounter in Ubuntu. And I saw just a hidden folder "." and an empty "README.TXT" file in the root.
ls -aR ...
1
vote
1answer
119 views
Migrate from Linux Mint to OS X [closed]
So my trusty Linux box died after 10 years of faithful service. The memorial will be Friday afternoon.
Anyway, I am moving to a Mac (lesser of two evils - a Win 10 machine was the other option), and ...
18
votes
2answers
4k views
cp behaves weirdly when . (dot) or .. (dot dot) are the source directory
This answer reveals that one can copy all files - including hidden ones - from directory src into directory dest like so:
mkdir dest
cp -r src/. dest
There is no explanation in the answer or its ...
1
vote
2answers
678 views
Symlinking all dot-files and -directories
Say I have a folder ~/dot containing some files and directories, such as
zshrc, Xresources, and emacs.d. How do I create symlinks to all of those in ~, but such that the symlinks begin with a dot (....
3
votes
2answers
2k views
Is there a way to have ls show hidden files for only certain directories?
I have a directory where regardless of user or options selected, I would like it to always show hidden files.
I know the -a option will show hidden files. I just want to automate the decision on ...
0
votes
1answer
364 views
Why does /etc/profile check PS1 rather than the -i flag in $-
I know of two ways to test whether a shell is interactive,
[[ $- == *i* ]] && echo "-i option flag indicates interactive"
[ -n "$PS1" ] && echo "prompt is set"
I've read that ...
3
votes
6answers
4k views
UNIX: How to change all hidden files to visible in a multiple sub directories
I have hundreds of sub directories in a directory that all have hidden files in them that I need to remove the period at the beginning of them to make them visible. I found a command to go into each ...
1
vote
2answers
354 views
Good way to prevent student from messing program settings in /home/user
I am a teacher and I use Linux which is great! But students are curious about this "new" operating system they do not know and in GUI they tweak program settings which affects hidden files inside /...
4
votes
2answers
12k views
rm wildcard not working
I want to delete all .swp files recursively. However:
rm -r *.swp
Gives:
rm: cannot remove ‘*.swp’: No such file or directory
Just to be sure, ls -all gives:
total 628
drwxr--r--. 8 przecze ...
1
vote
0answers
29 views
Methods to saving system configuration files [duplicate]
Normally user-specific config files would be dotfiles in the home-directory. If the user wanted a little more, they could put it in a dotfiles folder and symlink the files or use gnu stow to handle ...
0
votes
1answer
116 views
Bash use alternate dotfile?
I want to load my personalized bash file ~/.bashrc.me instead of the one that is located at ~/.bashrc
I was hoping there was something to the effect of:
bash --dotfile=.bashrc.me
Does such a thing ...
-3
votes
2answers
447 views
Hiding files without affecting the software or operating system's functionality [closed]
Random software keeps on creating folders in my home folder which gets messed up and disorganized. I decided to clean things up. I added a dot . in the beginning of the folder's names in order to hide ...
2
votes
1answer
2k views
Where to put bash configuration for newly created users? [duplicate]
I have an assignment and I'm confused which bash configuration file to edit.
I'm supposed to edit a bash configuration file and change the PS1 prompt and add an environment variable that searches ~/...
2
votes
1answer
6k views
Remove everything within directory using for loop
I am trying to remove large amount of mails (mostly mail delivery failed) from my server using
rm -rf /home/*/mail/new/*
And I am getting -bash: /usr/bin/rm: Argument list too long
I tried using ...
4
votes
4answers
1k views
bash moving hidden files, reset dotglob?
I wanted to move all files, including starting with dot (hidden) and folders (recursively).
So I used the following commands
shopt -s dotglob nullglob
mv ~/public/* ~/public_html/
and it worked.
...
0
votes
1answer
74 views
Would replacing sourced bash functions with executables decrease startup time
A typical bash setup, sourcees additional dotfiles on startup which obviously increases the startup time.
Is there an be any benefit of moving the contents of a function to its own executable file?
...
1
vote
1answer
429 views
Symlinking `init.el` in
I would like to symlink my emacs init.el into a dotfiles repo - located at ~/Documents/Dotfiles. However, when I attempt to do so the command fails even though my prompt doesn't return an error - ls -...
3
votes
1answer
255 views
Keeping dotfiles in sync for different folders
I am using Dropbox for storing my dotfiles from which I create soft links to my home directory. For configuration files which I do edit by myself it works very good, however applications like firefox ...
8
votes
1answer
472 views
How are files/dirs hidden from ls -a while still being accessible otherwise in a POSIX compliant system?
For example, in ZFS under FreeBSD and ZoL, there is a magic .zfs dir inside of each zpool mountpoint and you can use zfs set snapdir=visible to make that .zfs dir visible.
What makes me curious is: ...
1
vote
2answers
2k views
Bash pattern to match directories whose names begin with a dot (period), by being “explicit”, instead of using “shopt -s dotglob”?
When constructing a pattern that matches a file name such as /home/user/project/.git, how does one match the . character "explicitly" -- that is, without the use of shopt -s dotglob?
The manual at ...
2
votes
1answer
808 views
dotfiles: can/should(?) gnu stow make hard links, so I can still use xfce settings gui programs
I'm trying to manage my dotfiles under version control. My dotfiles repos contains a xfce-base folder, this folder contains the .config/xfce4/.../xy-setting.xml stuff. I can stow, or better, symlink ...
1
vote
2answers
2k views
How to ls with globbing for hidden files?
Why the following doesn't include hidden files ?
ls -a *vim*
that will return
ls: cannot access '*vim*': No such file or directory
ls -a | grep vim
.vim
.vimrc
1
vote
1answer
139 views
Creating a dotfile script
I asked this question over on SO and didn't get very far; here is the current version of my script and what I'd like the do. Suggestions for debugging and testing are what I'm looking for. I'll ...
3
votes
2answers
548 views
Dealing with machine specific configs when using git for configuration management
I've been using a git repo for managing my systems configs for a while now. I used the documentation on Digital Ocean tutorials here. Pretty much I have a remote repo on a server. Do a git clone of ...
