After running `systemctl --user enable lieer-google.timer`, systemctl created a
symlink pointing from timers.target.wants -> ../lieer-google.timer. I'm not sure
if tracking symlinks in a git repository is such a useful idea.
This commit reminds me that I could and should be using Nix to better manage
symlink creation and destruction.
I'm borrowing from @tazjin's dotfiles, which are stored in Git on Borg. When you
call `nix-build ~/briefcase/mail`, result will output a systemd units, which you
should move to ~/.config/systemd/user/.
The path to `gmi`, which is Lieer's executable, exists in /nix/store, and you
can read it from the systemd unit file (i.e. lieer-google.service). Lieer
synchronizes notmuch with Gmail and Gmail with notmuch.
Here's a general sequence of commands that I ran to set everything up. Special
thank you to @tazjin for helping me with all of this. These steps are not
certified as a tutorial; I'm recalling them from memory. When I set this up
things didn't work as expected immediately and I had to troubleshoot.
```shell
> mkdir -p ~/mail/account.google
> cd ~/mail/account.google
> nix-env -iA nixpkgs.notmuch
> notmuch setup
> nix-build ~/briefcase/mail
> cp ./result/lieer-google.{service,timer} ~/.config/systemd/user
> rm ./result
> systemctl --user cat lieer-google
...copy the /nix/store path to gmi...
> notmuch new
> /nix/store/gmi init
...follow the OAuth login flow...
>
```
Unknowns?
- Do I need to call `systemctl --user start lieer-google` at startup? Or should
I move these units to user/default.target.wants?
- Can I send email from notmuch?
- How do I use notmuch to delete email? To respond to emails? To do anything?
Todo:
- Once this configuration stabilizes, I should package everything with Nix.
I previously had an alias defined as `simple_vim`, which would start an instance
of Vim with a bare bones config. I had a to-do to Nixify it. That is
now (mostly) to-done.
When I try and install it with `nix-env -f ~/briefcase -iA tools.simple_vim`,
Nix fails and says that pkgs.stdenv is undefined. I will need to fix this one
day, but it is neither important nor urgent...
dkish was an idea to quickly create REPLs for all sorts of languages like
Haskell, Elixir, Clojure. I haven't used these, and if I started wanting these
with my newfound comfort with Nix, I think I'd reach for that instead.
Support a Mercurial alias for listing the files that have changed on a
particular branch.
This commit is particularly noisy because I reformatted the above aliases to
align with the new width.
Renaming my mono-repo briefcase.
I first introduced this commit in master, but it introduced a bug where one of
two things would happen:
1. Emacs wouldn't start and would crash X.
2. Emacs would start but my keyboard wouldn't work.
I learned some valuable debugging skills in the process. Here are some of them:
When my keyboard was broken, I wanted to control my computer using my
laptop. Thankfully this is possible by using `x2x`, which forward X events from
the SSH client to the SSH host.
```shell
> # I'm unsure if this is the *exact* command
> ssh -X desktop x2x -west :0.0
```
Git commit-local bisecting. I didn't need to do a `git bisect` because I knew
which commit introduced the bug; it was HEAD, master. But -- as you can see from
the size of this commit -- there are many changes involved. I wanted to binary
search through the changes, so I did the following workflow using `magit`:
- git reset --soft HEAD^
- git stash 1/2 of the files changed
- re-run `nix-env -f ~/briefcase/emacs -i`
- restart X session
- If the problem persists, the bug exists in the non-stashed files. Repeat the
process until you find the bug.
In my case, the bug was pretty benign. Calling `(exwm/switch "Dotfiles")` at the
bottom of `window-manager.el` was failing because "Dotfiles" is the name of a
non-existent workspace; it should've been `(exwm/switch "Briefcase")`.
There may have been more problems. I changed a few other things along the way,
including exposing the env vars BRIEFCASE to `wpcarros-emacs` inside of
`emacs/default.nix`.
The important part is that this was a valuable learning opportunity, and I'm
glad that I'm walking away from the two days of "lost productivity" feeling
actually productive.
Wrapping the `nix eval` incantation in a fish function for two reasons:
1. Document that this is how to evaluate Nix from a file.
2. Provide a more ergonomic way of evaluating Nix from a file.
After some confusion about my `emacsclient` is currently working as
expected. Perhaps it always did. I had `emacs --daemon` in my
`~/.xsessionrc.shared` for awhile, which may have confused
`emacsclient`. Whatever happened, I'm glad it's working now.
This function was causing problems with my Emacs. For example, when I ran
`wpc/find-file`, which is bound <leader>f and a KBD that I call frequently, the
internals would startup fish with my configuration file. Then `nix_find
autojump` would fail and the entire command would error. To make things worse,
the error was a bit opaque.
TODO: Why do certain commands `counsel-projectile-find-file` startup fish and
load my configuration file? I'd prefer it used something like bash and didn't
attempt to load a configuration file since that would most likely slow things
down.
I'm also making this my default theme for now. I'm growing a bit tired of
randomly assigning themes, since my `terminator` theme is not coupled to my
Emacs theme.
Calling `source` on `(direnv hook fish)` was creating startup problems with
fish. These problems leaked into a few of my Emacs file-searching commands as
well, which was pretty irritating for awhile. I'm still unsure of the
differences between `eval` and `source`. I'm moving on for now.
While I first switched to EXWM warily and thinking it would only be temporary,
it seems like this switch is here to stay. It turns out that EXWM was exactly
the integration I've been looking for. How serendipitous it that I found it when
I did.
Thank you, @tazjin.
I'm sure that there is a fish package that supports git aliases or
abbreviations. This time, I'm preferring to write my own.
Side note: The more that I use fish's abbreviations, the less that I like them
-- at least for the way in which I'm using them.
After some back-and-forth, I'm trialing fish shell instead of zsh as my default
shell. For now, I'm porting the aliases.zsh into config.fish -- defining them as
abbreviations instead of aliases; this preference may change. See the commentary
in config.fish for more information.
A spent a lot of time in zsh and built much configuration, so supporting fish
may take considerable time. Here's some work that remains:
TODO:
- Port functions.zsh
- Port variables.zsh
- Port zle.zsh
Currently paying the price of months of non-diligent git usage.
Here's what has changed.
- Theming support in Gvcci and wpgtk
- Dropping support for i3
- Supporting EXWM
- Many Elisp modules
- Collapsed redundant directories in ./configs
