Jake Worth

Jake Worth

Don't Copy-Paste Dotfiles

Published: March 09, 2022 • Updated: March 29, 2023 2 min read

  • terminal

A protip for program configuration files (dotfiles): don’t add configuration to them that you haven’t tried to understand and confirmed you want to have.

If you don’t know what a configuration does, you can spend a lot of time fixing a ‘bug’ that was misconfiguration or expected behavior caused by your unique setup. And, they slow down startup enough that each command should be a clear value-add, for you.

What are your thoughts on this? Let me know!


Join 100+ engineers who subscribe for advice, commentary, and technical deep-dives into the world of software.