Two Years Later, Same Tools, New Intent
By 2021, I hadn’t added much to my dotfiles in terms of features — but I had changed how I used them.
Two things had shifted: remote work became default, and my personal setup was being copied more often — either by teammates, collaborators, or simply across machines.
So I decided to make one thing clear: this system had to scale me. That meant less mess, less magic, and more repeatability.
This update is quiet. But it’s purposeful.
Introducing bootstrap.zsh: Start With Clarity
The major addition this cycle is a new file: bootstrap.zsh.
Its job? Encapsulate all environment bootstrapping in one place. Not aliases, not functions — just the pieces that set the stage for everything else to work.
# bootstrap.zsh
export DOTFILES="$HOME/.dotfiles"
export PATH="$HOME/bin:$PATH"
This file made .zshrc.symlink cleaner, more focused, and easier to read.
| File | Responsibility |
|---|---|
.zshrc.symlink | Just sources the bootstrap |
bootstrap.zsh | Sets up environment variables |
aliases.zsh | Shortcut logic (still lightweight) |
It made the repo feel intentional again.
Simplified .zshrc.symlink
I rewrote .zshrc.symlink to be almost empty:
source "$DOTFILES/bootstrap.zsh"
source "$DOTFILES/aliases.zsh"
source "$DOTFILES/functions.zsh"
No logic. No conditionals. Just includes.
This decoupling made it trivial to debug or reuse pieces individually.
Want just the aliases.zsh on a disposable VM? Easy. Want to test bootstrap on a clean machine? Go ahead.
Reconfirming Priorities: Simplicity and Portability
With more remote setups and multiple laptops in play, portability mattered.
This update didn’t add complexity — it removed assumptions. Gone are any hardcoded user paths, host-specific tweaks, or machine-only logic.
Everything sources from $DOTFILES. Everything assumes the simplest path.
export PATH="$HOME/bin:$PATH"
This line does more than it looks. It says: “I don’t need a framework — I just need to not trip over myself.”
A Shell That Boots Faster and Thinks Less
I didn’t touch the prompt. Still vcs_info, still silent, still mine:
autoload -Uz vcs_info
precmd() { vcs_info }
PROMPT='%n@%m %1~ ${vcs_info_msg_0_}%# '
What I did do was strip out runtime logic that didn’t need to run every boot. Bootstrap is about setup — once it’s stable, the terminal just loads fast.
Fewer conditionals. Fewer if/else paths. More confidence that it just works.
No Reinvention. Just Rebooting With Care.
There’s no big bang in this post. No shiny new CLI trick or fuzzy finder. Just a careful rebuild of the foundation.
2021 was about:
- Sharing my setup without friction
- Rebooting cleanly on new environments
- Decoupling logic for better reuse
- Scaling what works — and ditching what doesn’t