A Simple Tool For Setting Up New Macs

This blog post is about a Command Line Interface tool I just built called mac-setup. mac-setup helps save a few hours when you’re setting up developer environment on a new mac.

What it Does

mac-setup installs homebrew, oh-my-zsh, nvm, node, a bunch of applications (slack, notion, chrome, etc), several npm packages (like prettier and typescript), and a few brew “formulae” like git and zsh.

It also provides template .zshrc and .vimrc dotfiles. These files add a few of my favorite features to zsh and vim.

Please note, if you have already created a .zshrc or .vimrc configuration file, your settings will be lost.

Instructions

mac-setup is pretty straight forward to use. Here are the instructions:

1. Make sure your mac is connected to github - instructions
2. Open your terminal.
3. Navigate to user directory: cd ~
4. Clone repo: git clone [email protected]:edezekiel/mac-setup.git
5. Enter command: cd mac-setup && chmod +x ./mac-setup-script.sh && ./mac-setup-script.sh

Customization

You probably have your own favorite apps and npm packages that aren’t included in this tool. If you’d like to extend mac-setup, I’d recommend (i) forking the repo (ii) navigating to the mac-setup-script.sh in github, and (ii) editing the file however you’d like (you probably haven’t installed an IDE yet).

For example, if you use the Alfred productivity app, add the line brew cask install alfred to the script. Then follow the instructions above to run the program.

What it Doesn’t Do

This cli is barebones. Besides the zshrc and vimrc files, it does not set any configurations or log you in to any services. There is a tool called mackup for this purpose, but it doesn’t include some of my favorite apps (1Password7, Slack, Notion).

Additionally, mac-setup does not have a smart dotfile management system. As stated above it simply overrides your zshrc and vimrc files. I would checkout Anish Athalye’s tutorial and tool if you want to learn more about this topic.

Why Build “mac-setup”?

Last week, I joined a software development company in Memphis as a front-end web developer.

The company is called Ubisquisoft. They help companies build all kinds of software, including ful-stack web apps, mobile apps, and wearable device apps. I am very excited to join the team!

One of the first things I had to do was set up a development environment on my new computer. I thought this would be a breeze, but I didn’t realize just how much work it takes to set up an environment from scratch. At Flatiron, I had weeks to download applications, install command line tools, and tweak my laptop before Day 1. Even after class started I added more functionality to my laptop throughout the course.

So, starting at Ubiquisoft meant compressing that process into a few days/hours. In order to accomplish that I built mac-setup!