My Windows 10 Setup & Dotfiles

Goals of this setup

Working on Windows 10, on WSL 2 filesystem
Having a visually nice terminal (Windows Terminal)
zsh as my main shell
Using Docker and Docker Compose directly from zsh
Using IntelliJ IDEA directly from WSL 2

What's in this setup?

Host: Windows 10 2004+
- Ubuntu via WSL 2 (Windows Subsystem for Linux)
Terminal: Windows Terminal
Systemd
zsh
git
Docker
Docker Compose
Node.js (using Volta)
- node
- npm
- yarn
Go
IDE: IntelliJ IDEA, under WSL 2, used on Windows via VcXsrv
WSL Bridge: allow exposing WSL 2 ports on the network

Other guides

GitBash with zsh, for better git performances on Windows filesystem
Server

Setup WSL 2

Enable WSL 2 and update the linux kernel (Source)

# In PowerShell as Administrator

# Enable WSL and VirtualMachinePlatform features
dism.exe /online /enable-feature /featurename:Microsoft-Windows-Subsystem-Linux /all /norestart
dism.exe /online /enable-feature /featurename:VirtualMachinePlatform /all /norestart

# Download and install the Linux kernel update package
$wslUpdateInstallerUrl = "https://wslstorestorage.blob.core.windows.net/wslblob/wsl_update_x64.msi"
$downloadFolderPath = (New-Object -ComObject Shell.Application).NameSpace('shell:Downloads').Self.Path
$wslUpdateInstallerFilePath = "$downloadFolderPath/wsl_update_x64.msi"
$wc = New-Object System.Net.WebClient
$wc.DownloadFile($wslUpdateInstallerUrl, $wslUpdateInstallerFilePath)
Start-Process -Filepath "$wslUpdateInstallerFilePath"

# Set WSL default version to 2
wsl --set-default-version 2

Install Ubuntu from Microsoft Store

Install common dependencies

#!/bin/bash

sudo apt update && sudo apt install -y \
    apt-transport-https \
    ca-certificates \
    curl \
    gnupg-agent \
    software-properties-common \
    git \
    make \
    tig \
    tree \
    zip unzip \
    zsh

GPG key

If you already have a GPG key, restore it. If you did not have one, you can create one.

Restore

On old system, create a backup of a GPG key
- gpg --list-secret-keys
- gpg --export-secret-keys {{KEY_ID}} > /tmp/private.key
On new system, import the key:
- gpg --import /tmp/private.key
Delete the /tmp/private.key on both side

Create

gpg --full-generate-key

Read GitHub documentation about generating a new GPG key for more details.

Setup Git

#!/bin/bash

# Set username and email for next commands
email="contact@alex-d.fr"
username="Alex-D"
gpgkeyid="8FA78E6580B1222A"

# Configure Git
git config --global user.email "${email}"
git config --global user.name "${username}"
git config --global user.signingkey "${gpgkeyid}"
git config --global commit.gpgsign true
git config --global core.pager /usr/bin/less
git config --global core.excludesfile ~/.gitignore

# Generate a new SSH key
ssh-keygen -t rsa -b 4096 -C "${email}"

# Start ssh-agent and add the key to it
eval $(ssh-agent -s)
ssh-add ~/.ssh/id_rsa

# Display the public key ready to be copy pasted to GitHub
cat ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub

Add the generated key to GitHub

Setup zsh

#!/bin/bash

# Clone the dotfiles repository
mkdir -p ~/dev/dotfiles
git clone git@github.com:Alex-D/dotfiles.git ~/dev/dotfiles

# Install Antibody and generate .zsh_plugins.zsh
curl -sfL git.io/antibody | sudo sh -s - -b /usr/local/bin
antibody bundle < ~/dev/dotfiles/zsh_plugins > ~/.zsh_plugins.zsh

# Link custom dotfiles
ln -sf ~/dev/dotfiles/.aliases.zsh ~/.aliases.zsh
ln -sf ~/dev/dotfiles/.p10k.zsh ~/.p10k.zsh
ln -sf ~/dev/dotfiles/.zshrc ~/.zshrc
ln -sf ~/dev/dotfiles/.gitignore ~/.gitignore

# Create .screen folder used by .zshrc
mkdir ~/.screen && chmod 700 ~/.screen

# Change default shell to zsh
chsh -s $(which zsh)

Setup GitHub CLI

#!/bin/zsh

curl -fsSL https://cli.github.com/packages/githubcli-archive-keyring.gpg | sudo dd of=/usr/share/keyrings/githubcli-archive-keyring.gpg
echo "deb [arch=$(dpkg --print-architecture) signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/githubcli-archive-keyring.gpg] https://cli.github.com/packages stable main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/github-cli.list > /dev/null
sudo apt update
sudo apt install gh

Login gh command to GitHub via gh auth login

Docker

Setup Docker

#!/bin/zsh

# Add Docker to sources.list
curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu/gpg | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /usr/share/keyrings/docker-archive-keyring.gpg
echo \
  "deb [arch=amd64 signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/docker-archive-keyring.gpg] https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu \
  $(lsb_release -cs) stable" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/docker.list > /dev/null

# Install tools
sudo apt update && sudo apt install -y \
    docker-ce docker-ce-cli containerd.io

# Add user to docker group
sudo usermod -aG docker $USER

You can start Docker daemon via Systemd or via dcs alias.

Docker Compose

#!/bin/zsh

sudo curl -sL -o /usr/local/bin/docker-compose $(curl -s https://api.github.com/repos/docker/compose/releases/latest | grep "browser_download_url.*$(uname -s | awk '{print tolower($0)}')-$(uname -m)" | grep -v sha | cut -d: -f2,3 | tr -d \")
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/docker-compose

Node.js

#!/bin/zsh

# Install Volta
mkdir -p $VOLTA_HOME
curl https://get.volta.sh | bash -s -- --skip-setup

# Install node and package managers
volta install node npm yarn

Go

#!/bin/zsh

goVersion=1.16.4
curl -L "https://golang.org/dl/go${goVersion}.linux-amd64.tar.gz" > /tmp/go${goVersion}.linux-amd64.tar.gz
sudo rm -rf /usr/local/go
sudo tar -C /usr/local -xzf /tmp/go${goVersion}.linux-amd64.tar.gz
rm /tmp/go${goVersion}.linux-amd64.tar.gz

See official documentation

IntelliJ IDEA

I run IntelliJ IDEA in WSL 2, and get its GUI on Windows via X Server (VcXsrv).

Setup VcXsrv

Install VcXsrv (XLaunch)

windowsUserProfile=/mnt/c/Users/$(cmd.exe /c "echo %USERNAME%" 2>/dev/null | tr -d '\r')

# Run VcXsrv at startup
cp ~/dev/dotfiles/config.xlaunch "${windowsUserProfile}/AppData/Roaming/Microsoft/Windows/Start Menu/Programs/Startup"

Install IntelliJ IDEA

#!/bin/zsh

# Install IDEA dependencies
sudo apt update && sudo apt install -y \
    fontconfig \
    libxss1 \
    libnss3 \
    libatk1.0-0 \
    libatk-bridge2.0-0 \
    libgbm1 \
    libpangocairo-1.0-0 \
    libcups2 \
    libxkbcommon0

# Create install folder
sudo mkdir /opt/idea

# Allow your user to run IDEA updates from GUI
sudo chown $UID:$UID /opt/idea

# Download IntelliJ IDEA
curl -L "https://download.jetbrains.com/product?code=IIU&latest&distribution=linux" | tar vxz -C /opt/idea --strip 1

Setup Windows Terminal

Download and install JetBrains Mono
Install Windows Terminal

#!/bin/zsh

windowsUserProfile=/mnt/c/Users/$(cmd.exe /c "echo %USERNAME%" 2>/dev/null | tr -d '\r')

# Copy Windows Terminal settings
cp ~/dev/dotfiles/terminal-settings.json ${windowsUserProfile}/AppData/Local/Packages/Microsoft.WindowsTerminal_8wekyb3d8bbwe/LocalState/settings.json

WSL Bridge

When a port is listening from WSL 2, it cannot be reached. You need to create port proxies for each port you want to use. To avoid doing than manually each time I start my computer, I've made the wslb alias that will run the wsl2bridge.ps1 script in an admin Powershell.

#!/bin/zsh

windowsUserProfile=/mnt/c/Users/$(cmd.exe /c "echo %USERNAME%" 2>/dev/null | tr -d '\r')

# Get the hacky network bridge script
cp ~/dev/dotfiles/wsl2-bridge.ps1 ${windowsUserProfile}/wsl2-bridge.ps1

In order to allow wsl2-bridge.ps1 script to run, you need to update your PowerShell execution policy.

# In PowerShell as Administrator

Set-ExecutionPolicy -ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned
PowerShell -File $env:USERPROFILE\\wsl2-bridge.ps1

Then, when port forwarding does not work between WSL 2 and Windows, run wslb from zsh:

#!/bin/zsh

wslb

Note: This is a custom alias. See .aliases.zsh for more details

Limit WSL 2 RAM consumption

#!/bin/zsh

windowsUserProfile=/mnt/c/Users/$(cmd.exe /c "echo %USERNAME%" 2>/dev/null | tr -d '\r')

# Avoid too much RAM consumption
cp ~/dev/dotfiles/.wslconfig ${windowsUserProfile}/.wslconfig

Note: You can adjust the RAM amount in .wslconfig file. Personally, I set it to 8 GB.

Install kubectl

#!/bin/zsh

sudo curl -fsSLo /usr/share/keyrings/kubernetes-archive-keyring.gpg https://packages.cloud.google.com/apt/doc/apt-key.gpg
echo "deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/kubernetes-archive-keyring.gpg] https://apt.kubernetes.io/ kubernetes-xenial main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/kubernetes.list
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install -y kubectl

Original documentation

Install AWS CLI

#!/bin/zsh

cd /tmp/aws-cli
curl "https://awscli.amazonaws.com/awscli-exe-linux-x86_64.zip" -o "awscliv2.zip"
unzip awscliv2.zip
sudo ./aws/install
cd -
rm -rf /tmp/aws-cli

Original documentation

Setup Git Filter Repo

#!/bin/zsh

git clone git@github.com:newren/git-filter-repo.git /tmp/git-filter-repo
cd /tmp/git-filter-repo
make snag_docs
sudo cp -a git-filter-repo $(git --exec-path)
sudo cp -a Documentation/man1/git-filter-repo.1 $(git --man-path)/man1
sudo cp -a Documentation/html/git-filter-repo.html $(git --html-path)
cd -
rm -rf /tmp/git-filter-repo

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README.md

README.md

My Windows 10 Setup & Dotfiles

Goals of this setup

What's in this setup?

Other guides

Setup WSL 2

Install common dependencies

GPG key

Restore

Create

Setup Git

Setup zsh

Setup GitHub CLI

Docker

Setup Docker

Docker Compose

Node.js

Go

IntelliJ IDEA

Setup VcXsrv

Install IntelliJ IDEA

Setup Windows Terminal

WSL Bridge

Limit WSL 2 RAM consumption

Install kubectl

Install AWS CLI

Setup Git Filter Repo

Files

README.md

Latest commit

History

README.md

File metadata and controls

My Windows 10 Setup & Dotfiles

Goals of this setup

What's in this setup?

Other guides

Setup WSL 2

Install common dependencies

GPG key

Restore

Create

Setup Git

Setup zsh

Setup GitHub CLI

Docker

Setup Docker

Docker Compose

Node.js

Go

IntelliJ IDEA

Setup VcXsrv

Install IntelliJ IDEA

Setup Windows Terminal

WSL Bridge

Limit WSL 2 RAM consumption

Install kubectl

Install AWS CLI

Setup Git Filter Repo