filiparag/sydf

Symlink Your Damn Files

Symlink Your Damn Files

Description

sydf is a bash utility for managing files. Main purpose of this utility is to make sharing and syncing dotfiles across devices as easy as possible by keeping them in a single directory. It is intended to be used in conjunction with git, syncthing, borgbackup, nextcloud and other programs.

Installation

Arch User repository

You can install the latest version of sydf from AUR using your favourite package manager:

yay -S sydf

Manual

Run these commands in your terminal to set up sydf system-wide:

# Download latest stable release
REL=$(curl -LsI 'https://github.com/filiparag/sydf/releases/latest' | grep -Po 'tag\/\K(\S+)')
curl -L "https://github.com/filiparag/sydf/releases/download/$REL/sydf" > /tmp/sydf

# Download latest development version - not recommended
curl -L "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/filiparag/sydf/master/sydf" > /tmp/sydf

chmod +x /tmp/sydf
sudo mv /tmp/sydf /usr/bin/sydf

Warning: installing the latest development version as opposed to a stable release might result in broken features and data loss! Proceed with caution.

Usage

Initialization

Similar to a git repository, sydf needs a working directory for file managment. Default directory is $HOME/.sydf.

sydf init <DIRECTORY>

Adding files and directories

Adding files to sydf means that they will get moved to its working directory and a symbolic link will be placed in their original place. Linking a directory will move it same as it was a regular file, so its content won't be symlinked individually. Plan ahead and decide if moving individual files inside directory is better suited for your needs - wildcards are supported in both add and remove commands.

sydf add <FILE1> <DIRECTORY> <FILE2>...

Removing files and directories

Removing a file or a directory from sydf means reversing what adding them did. Symbolic link is destroyed and the file is put back into its original place. This operation will not harm any of your files, unlike similar command for git.

sydf remove <FILE> <DIRECTORY>...

List

Show a list of files and directories managed by sydf.

# List managed directories
sydf list dirs

# List files outside managed directories
sydf list files

# List all managed files and directories
sydf list all

# List files and directories inside .old directory
sydf list old

Hook

Hooking will attempt to link all files and directories inside sydf's working directory to their respective places on system. This comand is intended to be used for transfer of your managed files to another machine or sharing with another user. If a file already exists in targeted place, it will be safely moved to .old directory inside sydf's working directory.

sydf hook

Unhook

Unhooking will replace all symbolic links created by sydf with corresponding files and directories. Contents of sydf's working directory will stay unaffected by this operation.

sydf unhook

Revert

Revert can be used to completely undo all actions performed on the filesystem outside sydf's working directory. All created directories will be removed unless they contain data not managed by sydf. Reverting will not work if files are unhooked beforehand.

sydf revert

Warning: any modification of the .old directory inside of the working folder might break reversion process!

Ignore

If you want to have some unmanaged paths like .git inside the working directory, you can add them to the ignore list. All ignored paths include their subpaths automatically.

# List ignored paths
sydf ignore

# Add paths to ignore list
sydf ignore add <PATH> ...

# Remove paths from ignore list
sydf ignore remove <PATH> ...

All ignored paths are relative to the sydf's working directory.