How I set up a laptop

Peter Wildeford

Nov 22, 2024 — 3 min read

Here is a list of things I do starting from a fresh Macbook to get it the way I want. This is mostly for my personal reference but others might find interesting tips within it.

Download Chrome, set as default browser, log in

Ensure that key extensions I like load: Wikiwand, New Tab Studio, Minimal Twitter, Unpaywall, and 1Password

If not already – Change keyboard layout to US

Import "New Tab Studio" theme from file

Settings

Appearance → Sidebar icon style: small
Siri and Spotlight → Turn Siri off
Desktop and Dock → minimize size, maximize magnification, automatically show and hide
Keyboard → max keyboard repeat rate (fastest), max delay until repeat (quickest)
Keyboard → Keyboard shortcuts → Modifier keys → Map Caps Lock to ESC
Trackpad → max tracking speed (fastest)
Turn off “Notes” ::: Desktop & Screen Saver/Dock → Hot Corners (button at bottom) → bottom-right corner → set to “Blank (—)”

iCloud setup

Download all
Switch sidebar to iCloud versions

Remove everything from the dock

Get Alfred

Get Rectangle, make app full screen

Get Slack, sign in, shrink text

Get Kindle

Get Swinsian

Download Swinsian
set up date added, last date played, and play count

Get Gimp

Get Multi-clipboard

make sure to grant accessibility and set it to open on login
Set remember to 50 and display to 50

Get Flux

Get Meeting bar

Get Hidden bar

Get Cold Turkey

Get Anki, sync from online

Set TextEdit to plain text, turn off all options

Get Zoom

Get iTerm

Get brew:

/bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install.sh)"

(echo; echo 'eval "$(/opt/homebrew/bin/brew shellenv)"') >> /Users/peterwildeford/.zprofile

eval "$(/opt/homebrew/bin/brew shellenv)"

Get ohmyzsh: sh -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ohmyzsh/ohmyzsh/master/tools/install.sh)"

Get tmux: brew install tmux

Get MacLaTeX:

brew install --cask mactex
eval "$(/usr/libexec/path_helper)"

Configure Git:

git config --global user.email "peter@peterhuford.com"

git config --global user.name "Peter Wildeford"

Install plugins:

brew install the_silver_searcher
brew install tree
brew install htop

cd ~/.oh-my-zsh/custom/plugins
sudo git clone https://github.com/peterhurford/git-aliases.zsh.git
sudo git clone https://github.com/peterhurford/git-it-on.zsh.git
sudo git clone https://github.com/robertzk/send.zsh.git
sudo git clone https://github.com/peterhurford/up.zsh.git
sudo git clone https://github.com/olivierverdier/zsh-git-prompt.git
sudo git clone https://github.com/zsh-users/zsh-syntax-highlighting.git
sudo git clone https://github.com/zsh-users/zsh-autosuggestions
sudo mv send.zsh send
sudo mv up.zsh up
sudo mv git-it-on.zsh git-it-on
sudo mv git-aliases.zsh git-aliases

mkdir -p ~/.vim/autoload ~/.vim/bundle
curl -LSso ~/.vim/autoload/pathogen.vim https://tpo.pe/pathogen.vim
cd ~/.vim/bundle
git clone https://github.com/corntrace/bufexplorer.git
git clone https://github.com/kien/ctrlp.vim.git
git clone https://github.com/motemen/git-vim.git
git clone https://github.com/peterhurford/macroutils.vim.git
git clone https://github.com/danro/rename.vim.git
git clone https://github.com/peterhurford/send.vim.git
git clone https://github.com/ervandew/supertab.git
git clone https://github.com/peterhurford/swapquote.vim.git
git clone https://github.com/Townk/vim-autoclose.git
git clone https://github.com/tpope/vim-commentary.git
git clone https://github.com/Lokaltog/vim-easymotion.git
git clone https://github.com/justincampbell/vim-eighties.git
git clone https://github.com/tpope/vim-endwise.git
git clone https://github.com/fweep/vim-zsh-path-completion.git
git clone https://github.com/peterhurford/vimflow

mkdir ~/dev
cd ~/dev

git clone https://github.com/peterhurford/dotfiles.git
rm ~/.inputrc
ln -s ~/dev/dotfiles/inputrc ~/.inputrc
rm ~/.tmux.conf
ln -s ~/dev/dotfiles/tmux.conf ~/.tmux.conf
rm ~/.vimrc
ln -s ~/dev/dotfiles/vimrc ~/.vimrc
rm ~/.zshrc
touch ~/.secret_zshrc # A secret file to store your exported tokens.
ln -s ~/dev/dotfiles/zshrc ~/.zshrc
rm ~/.bash_profile
ln -s ~/dev/dotfiles/bash_profile ~/.bash_profile

Restart iTerm

Install Python:

brew install python
brew install pyenv
brew install libomp

git clone https://github.com/pyenv/pyenv-virtualenv.git $(pyenv root)/plugins/pyenv-virtualenv

pyenv install 3.11.0
pyenv global 3.11.0

brew install virtualenvwrapper
pyenv virtualenv 3.11.0 dev

bootpython

Install R:

brew install harfbuzz
brew install fribidi
brew install r

Set up SSH key for GitHub