New Laptop Configuration (Second Edition)

Posted on 3 mins read

Introduction

This is the second edition to “New Laptop Configuration”.

Backup

When moving laptops I will temporarily backup my existing GPG and SSH keys (encrypted) to an external data storage device.

We start by making a directory to hold the files temporarily:

mkdir /tmp/keys

Next I start backing up my GPG data:

# Export the secret key that encrypts all the data in my 'password store'.
# I encode the binary data in a ASCII armored file (.asc).
gpg --export-secret-keys --armor <NAME> > /tmp/keys/<NAME>.asc

# Once exported I add a password to the file so people are unable to open it.
# This will produce a .asc.gpg file.
gpg --symmetric /tmp/keys/<NAME>.asc

# To prevent having to trust all the same keys as before I'll export the trust database.
gpg --export-ownertrust > /tmp/keys/trustdb.txt 

# Lastly, I move the files to my external flash drive (USB).
mv /tmp/keys/<NAME>.asc.gpg /Volumes/.../<NAME>.asc.gpg
mv /tmp/keys/trustdb.txt /Volumes/.../trustdb.txt

Next, I backup my SSH data:

# Recursively copy all files into a zip archive.
zip -r /tmp/keys/sshbackup ~/.ssh/

# I list the contents of the zip archive to be sure I have everything in there.
unzip -l /tmp/keys/sshbackup.zip

# Once archived I add a password to the file so people are unable to open it.
# This will produce a .zip.gpg file.
gpg --symmetric /tmp/keys/sshbackup.zip

# Lastly, I move the file to my external flash drive (USB).
mv /tmp/keys/sshbackup.zip.gpg /Volumes/.../sshbackup.zip.gpg

Then I clear out the temporary directory:

rm -rf /tmp/keys

Steps

  1. Install Rust.
curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf https://sh.rustup.rs | sh
  1. Install Go.
https://go.dev/dl/
  1. Import GPG/SSH keys.
mkdir /tmp/keys
cd /tmp/keys

gpg --decrypt /tmp/keys/<NAME>.gpg > <NAME>
gpg --import <NAME>.asc

rm ~/.gnupg/trustdb.gpg
gpg --import-ownertrust < /tmp/keys/trustdb.txt

gpg --decrypt /tmp/keys/sshbackup.zip.gpg > sshbackup.zip
unzip /tmp/keys/sshbackup.zip
mv /tmp/keys/.ssh/ ~/

rm -rf /tmp/keys
  1. Setup SSH.
eval "$(ssh-agent -s)"
ssh-add --apple-use-keychain ~/.ssh/github

NOTE: I’ve since moved to https://www.warp.dev/ (see my Dev Tools post)
so I no longer use Alacritty or Fig (steps 5 and 6 below).

  1. Install Alacritty.
# https://github.com/alacritty/alacritty/releases
mkdir .bash_completion
curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/alacritty/alacritty/master/extra/completions/alacritty.bash -o ~/.bash_completion/alacritty
  1. Install Fig.
https://fig.io/
  1. Install Homebrew + packages.
# https://brew.sh
brew bundle --file /tmp/Brewfile install
  1. Change default shell to Zsh.
echo /opt/homebrew/bin/zsh | sudo tee -a /etc/shells
chsh -s /opt/homebrew/bin/zsh

NOTE: I’ve since moved to https://neovim.io/ (see my Dev Tools post)
so I no longer use Vim-Plug (step 9 below).

  1. Configure Vim-Plug.
sh -c 'curl -fLo "${XDG_DATA_HOME:-$HOME/.local/share}"/nvim/site/autoload/plug.vim --create-dirs \
     https://raw.githubusercontent.com/junegunn/vim-plug/master/plug.vim'

NOTE: I no longer use tmux (see my Dev Tools post)
so a bunch of the following step 10 has changed.

  1. Setup dotfiles.

NOTE: Don’t forget to execute ‘prefix + I’ in tmux to install plugins.

cd /tmp
git clone https://github.com/tmux-plugins/tpm ~/.tmux/plugins/tpm
git clone https://github.com/Integralist/dotfiles.git
curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/git/git/master/contrib/completion/git-prompt.sh -o ~/.git-prompt.sh
curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/git/git/master/contrib/completion/git-completion.zsh -o ~/.zsh/_git
cp -R .alacritty.yml .zsh .zshrc .config .gitconfig .gitignore .gnupg .ignore .inputrc .leptonrc .tmux.conf ~/
chown -R $(whoami) ~/.gnupg/
chmod 600 ~/.gnupg/*
chmod 700 ~/.gnupg
  1. Setup password store.
KEY_ID=$(gpg --list-keys <NAME> | head -n 2 | tail -n 1 | cut -d ' ' -f 7)
pass init $KEY_ID
pass git init
pass git remote add origin git@github.com:<private/repo>
pass git pull

NOTE: I no longer use Safari (see my Dev Tools post)
so step 12 is redundant now.

  1. Safari extensions.
AdBlock One
Dark Reader for Safari
Super Agent for Safari (Cookie Consent Automation)
Tab Sessions
  1. Configure OS.
- Dock (Automatically hide and show the Dock)
- Keyboard (Key Repeat = Fast, Delay Until Repeat = Short)
- Accessibility > Zoom (Use keyboard shortcuts to zoom)
- Date & Time > Clock (Show date + Display the time with seconds)
- Mission Control (disable "Automatically rearrange Spaces based on most recent use")
- Terminal Developer Mode (`spctl developer-mode enable-terminal`)
- Wake up from sleep (`sudo pmset -a standbydelay 7200`)

But before we wrap up... time (once again) for some self-promotion 🙊