Setting up a productive dev environment on Linux

This is the companion piece to my post about why I use Linux for web development. That post covered the reasoning. This one covers the setup.

Terminal: Alacritty + tmux

I use Alacritty as my terminal emulator. It is GPU-accelerated, fast, and configured through a single YAML file. No menus, no settings dialogs. You edit the config and it reloads.

For session management I use tmux. Multiple windows, split panes, persistent sessions that survive terminal crashes. My tmux config is minimal. I remapped the prefix to Ctrl+a and set up a few keybindings for splitting and navigating panes.

# .tmux.conf
set -g prefix C-a
unbind C-b
bind C-a send-prefix
 
bind | split-window -h
bind - split-window -v
 
set -g mouse on
set -g default-terminal "tmux-256color"

Shell: Zsh + minimal plugins

I use Zsh with a handful of plugins through zinit. No heavy frameworks like oh-my-zsh. The plugins I actually use:

• zsh-autosuggestions for fish-like suggestions from history
• zsh-syntax-highlighting for command syntax colors
• fzf integration for fuzzy finding files and history

My prompt is starship, which is fast and customizable without being bloated.

Editor: VSCodium

I use VSCodium, which is VS Code built from the open-source repository without Microsoft's telemetry and tracking. It looks and works identically to VS Code, supports the same extensions, and does not phone home.

The extensions I rely on:

• ESLint and Prettier for code formatting
• GitLens for git blame and history
• Tailwind CSS IntelliSense for autocomplete
• Error Lens for inline error display

Node management: fnm

I use fnm (Fast Node Manager) instead of nvm. It is written in Rust, starts up instantly (nvm adds noticeable delay to shell startup), and supports .node-version and .nvmrc files.

fnm install 22
fnm default 22

Package management: pnpm

pnpm is my default package manager. Faster installs, strict dependency resolution, and workspace support for monorepos. I have written a separate post about pnpm workspaces if you want the details.

Other tools

• ripgrep (rg) for searching code. Faster than grep and respects .gitignore.
• fd for finding files. Faster than find with better defaults.
• bat as a cat replacement with syntax highlighting.
• lazygit for a terminal git UI when the command line gets tedious.
• docker and docker compose for local services.

Dotfiles

I keep all of this in a dotfiles repository managed with GNU Stow. Each tool's config lives in its own directory, and stow creates the symlinks. Reinstalling on a new machine takes about 15 minutes.

The setup takes some upfront effort, but once it is dialed in, it is fast, stable, and entirely under your control.

Sources

• Alacritty
• tmux
• Starship Prompt
• VSCodium
• fnm (Fast Node Manager)
• ripgrep
• fd
• bat
• lazygit