// the find
necolas/dotfiles
OS X dotfiles: bash, git, vim, etc.
Personal macOS dotfiles from Nicolas Gallagher, the ex-Twitter/GitHub engineer behind normalize.css. Covers bash, git, vim, and macOS system defaults with a clean install script that bootstraps Homebrew and symlinks config files. It's one person's opinionated setup, not a framework.
The install script is thoughtful — it saves the install location to ~/.config/dotfiles/config so reruns don't prompt again, and it copies gitconfig rather than symlinking it specifically to avoid committing credentials. The bash prompt shows git branch state (staged/unstaged/untracked/stashed) without pulling in a heavy prompt framework. The --link flag for quick local-only updates is the right call for daily dev workflow.
Bash-only in 2026 is a real limitation — no zsh support, which is the macOS default since Catalina. The Homebrew formula list is thin (git, node, a handful of utilities) with no obvious way to extend it for project-specific tooling without editing the script directly. Vim config without a plugin manager means adding plugins is manual, and there's no fish/zsh/nushell escape hatch if your shell preferences diverge. Also, ~800 stars suggests this never became a community resource — you're adopting one person's personal config, which is fine, but don't expect a maintained ecosystem around it.