Declarative Dotfiles Linker

This is ddlinker a cli tool to manage your dotfiles... Declaratively! ddlinker will parse the .ddlinker_config.toml inside your current working directory and create symlinks for you.

Why

I really like the declarative nature of tools like Nix and NixOS, but I don't like the way they manage dotfiles for my linux system(s). So after a bit of time a decided to create ddlinker to manage my dotfiles the way I like it and now it's my go tool to do that!

Installation

To install, you'll need go installed and run

go install github.com/4madness7/ddlinker@latest

Usage

ddlinker <flags> <command>

Flags	Description	Usage
-h,--help	When used, prints help menu or description for specified command.	ddlinker --help <command>
-v,--verbose	When used, ddlinker will print more detailed output.	ddlinker --verbose <command>

Commands	Description	Usage
generate	Generates '.ddlinker_config.toml' file in current directory.	ddlinker generate
link	Creates symlinks based on the configuration provided. Use it with '-v' for absolute paths.	ddlinker <flags> link
preview	Shows a preview of the final links. Use it with '-v' for absolute paths.	ddlinker <flags> preview

Examples

ddlinker uses a .ddlinker_config.toml to configure all links.

Here's an example of what the file looks like:

[[destinations]] # this will add a new item to the destinations list
name = "config" # unique identifier for destination
path = "~/.config" # unique path for destination
links = [ # all the links in the current working directory to link
    "hypr",
    "nvim",
]

[[destinations]]
name = "home"
path = "~"
links = [ ".zshrc" ]

[[destinations]]
name = "local-bin"
path = "~/.local"
links = [ "bin" ]

The config above will create the links as following:

./.zshrc -> ~/.zshrc

./hypr -> ~/.config/hypr
./nvim -> ~/.config/nvim

./bin -> ~/.local/bin

The preview command will give an output like this:

Destination name: home
Destination path: ~
Preview:
  ./.zshrc -> ~/.zshrc

Destination name: config
Destination path: ~/.config
Preview:
  ./hypr -> ~/.config/hypr
  ./nvim -> ~/.config/nvim

Destination name: local-bin
Destination path: ~/.local
Preview:
  ./bin -> ~/.local/bin

The link command will give an output like this:

Linking 'home' | Path: '~'
  Done | ./.zshrc -> ~/.zshrc # if linked correctly

Linking 'config' | Path: '~/.config'
  Already linked | ./hypr -> ~/.config/hypr # if link is already present
  Error: file/dir already exists | ./nvim -> ~/.config/nvim # if there is already a file/dir in the destination

Linking 'local-bin' | Path: '~/.local'
  Error: destination is a symlink to a different file/dir | ./bin -> ~/.local/bin # if destination is a symlink, but points to a different file/dir

Contributing

To contribute, feel free to a new branch and send in a pull request.

All PRs should be submitted to the main branch.