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+---
+date: 2022-06-09T19:10:00+02:00
+category: linux
+draft: fale
+type: productivity
+title: Managing dotfiles with GNU Stow
+---
+If you are working with linux/bsd based system, you are most likely accustomed to managing
+your configs with dotfiles. And you most likely have them stored with Git. But there is the
+never ending problem of how to actually use them. I have moved management of this under
+GNU Stow.
+<!--more-->
+Let's take a very typical dotfiles repository.
+
+```
+./nvim/init.lua
+./tmux/tmux.conf
+```
+
+You want to have those files available as 
+
+```
+~/.config/nvim/init.lua
+~/.tmux.conf
+```
+
+The most popular approach would be to symlink the files under the expected location. We
+could also copy the files every time something changes, but that would be crazy. Are we 
+the stuck with having to do those symlinks manually every time we install a new machine
+or create a virtual one? And what if we have dozens of such configs stored under git? 
+
+## Symlink farm
+
+GNU Stow is a symlink farm. This means, that it's a system aimed at automating creating of
+those symlinks.
+
+[GNU Stow website](https://www.gnu.org/software/stow/manual/stow.html)
+
+For Stow, the dotfiles directory is called "Stowed" directory. Now comes the cool part. Each folder
+in the Stowed directory (called "Package directory") stores a separate directory tree. GNU
+Stow will join all those separate trees and create a proper structure under Target Directory,
+which by default is the parent of Stowed directory. Let's look at example.
+
+```
+~/target/stow/one/config/one.conf
+~/target/stow/two/config/two.conf
+~/target/stow/three/config/three.conf
+```
+
+So, our home director now has a "Target" directory, which has a "Stow" directory. The Stow
+directory stores three configs which we want to sylink as
+
+
+```
+~/target/config/one.conf
+~/target/config/two.conf
+~/target/config/three.conf
+```
+
+Let's stow the first one
+
+```
+cd ~/target/stow
+stow one
+```
+
+And see what happened
+
+```
+cd ~/target
+ls -lA
+```
+
+We get somethine like
+
+```
+lrwxrwxrwx 1 msapka wheel   15 Jun  9 23:01 config -> stow/one/config
+drwxr-xr-x 5 msapka wheel 4096 Jun  9 22:55 stow
+```
+
+Stow created a config symlink in the target directory. Very cool, but it gets cooler! Let'
+stow the second one
+
+```
+cd ~/target/stow
+stow two
+```
+
+and what we get
+
+```
+drwxr-xr-x 2 msapka wheel 4096 Jun  9 23:03 config
+drwxr-xr-x 5 msapka wheel 4096 Jun  9 22:55 stow
+```
+
+Our config is no longer a symlink, but a real folder. Let's see what's inside here.
+
+```
+cd config
+ls -lA
+```
+
+```
+lrwxrwxrwx 1 msapka wheel 27 Jun  9 23:03 one.conf -> ../stow/two/config/one.conf
+lrwxrwxrwx 1 msapka wheel 26 Jun  9 23:03 two.conf -> ../stow/one/config/two.conf
+```
+
+We have our two configs, but what has happened? Stow looked at both sub trees for "one" and
+"two"m and joined then in a way, that is possible. The only way for one.conf and two.conf to 
+exist in config is if config is a normal directory. Extremely cool!
+
+Let's image that our target is actually homedir, so we have a ~/dotfiles directory. Then
+each package directory can mimic the tree struture of the actual config! Coming back
+to our example, we can have a 
+
+```
+~/dotfiles/tmux/.tmux.conf
+~/dotfiles/nvim/.config/nvim/init.lua
+```
+
+Then, after stowing both packages we have symlinks under our desired
+
+
+```
+~/.config/nvim/init.lua
+~/.tmux.conf
+```
+
+GNU Stow is a very simple tool. All we understand what will happen with each sub tree.