Cider is a simple wrapper for Homebrew and Homebrew Cask that allows you to save your setup across different machines. This lets you to restore a backup without having to deal with the mess that was the state of your previous installation, or painstakingly babysit the process step-by-step.
Simply run the following on a new machine:
git clone [YOUR_REPO] ~/.cider
cider restore
... and you’ll be back up and running, with all of your applications and command line utilities re-installed (and configurations restored).
In addition to Homebrew, Cider also supports managing your user defaults, restoring symlinks, and running scripts to conveniently manage other settings such as your dotfiles.
Cider is available directly from PyPI:
pip install cider
All configuration files are stored in the ~/.cider directory as JSON. E.g., here’s an example bootstrap file:
{
"after-scripts": [
"brew linkapps"
],
"casks": [
"adobe-creative-cloud",
"dropbox",
"firefox",
"flash",
"flux",
"github",
"google-chrome",
"google-hangouts",
"heroku-toolbelt",
"iterm2",
"mplayerx",
"sublime-text",
"transmission",
],
"formulas": [
"brew-cask",
"emacs",
"fish",
"git",
"go",
"macvim --overwrite-system-vi",
"python",
"python3",
"xctool"
],
"icons": {
"iTerm": "https://dribbble.com/shots/1702947-iTerm-Replacement-Icon/attachments/271548"
},
"symlinks": {
"bash/.*": "~",
"bin/*": "~/bin/",
"git/.*": "~",
"sh/.*": "~",
"vim/.*": "~"
},
"taps": [
"caskroom/cask"
]
}
User defaults are stored similarly:
{
"NSGlobalDomain": {
"ApplePressAndHoldEnabled": false
},
"com.apple.dock": {
"tilesize": 48
},
"com.iconfactor.mac.xScope": {
"generalShowDockIcon": false
}
}
To see how this works out in practice, feel free to take a look at my dotfiles.
To save the state of your existing setup:
mkdir ~/.cider
touch ~/.cider/bootstrap.json
cider missing
cider cask missing
There doesn't seem to be a way to re-install purchases made from Mac App Store via the command line just yet, so those have to be done by hand.
Note: Cider is a work-in-progress, but it’s fairly well-tested and should be kind to your machine.