Distro Porting Matrix

How to stamp dotfiles-Arch, dotfiles-openSUSE, dotfiles-Alpine, and dotfiles-Gentoo from the dotfiles-Fedora template. The structure is identical every time — only three things change per distro: package manager commands, package names, and distro quirks. Core never changes (it’s vendored). Kali and macOS appear in the reference tables below for convenience, but they’re their own lineages — built directly, not stamped from this template (see Repo status at the bottom).

Per-repo recipe

1. cp -r dotfiles-Fedora dotfiles-<Distro>
2. Rename os/fedora.zsh → os/<distro>.zsh; swap clipboard + pkg-manager aliases.
3. Replace install/packages.txt with that distro’s names (table below).
4. In bootstrap.sh: swap the dnf block for the distro’s installer and the /etc/os-release guard string.
5. git subtree add --prefix=core <dotfiles-core> main --squash
6. Update the README’s “specifics” section to that distro’s quirks.

Package-manager commands

Package names (modern CLI stack)

¹ openSUSE: may be in devel repos; if absent, cargo install tealdeer. ² Alpine default shell is ash; you must apk add zsh explicitly. ³ Not packaged or stale → use the upstream installer / cargo install (same pattern bootstrap.sh already uses on Fedora). Add cargo/rust to packages. ⁴ Debian/Kali ship these under different binary names — bat runs as batcat, the fd-find package installs fdfind. Core’s tools.zsh already resolves both, so aliases and config work unchanged. ⁵ nvim-treesitter (pinned to main) needs tree-sitter-cli ≥ 0.26.1. Mac: tree-sitter-cli via brew — not tree-sitter, which is now lib-only. Fedora: tree-sitter-cli via dnf (verify ≥ 0.26.1, else mise/cargo). Arch: extra carries 0.26.9 (clears the floor). Where unpackaged: mise use -g tree-sitter or cargo install tree-sitter-cli. On Alpine it must be a musl build — prefer cargo over any prebuilt binary. ⁶ yq: this matrix targets mikefarah’s Go yq (the jq-for-YAML). Distros also ship Python yq (kislyuk) under the same yq name; if you land the wrong one, install the Go build via mise use -g yq or the upstream release binary. ⁷ shfmt: not always in stable apt (Debian/Kali) and the Gentoo atom is dev-go/shfmt. If the package is missing, mise use -g shfmt or go install mvdan.cc/sh/v3/cmd/shfmt@latest. (These mid-2026 rows are best-effort — verify the exact package on first stamp of each distro.) ⁸ jujutsu (jj): OPT-IN, additive git companion — never replaces git, so a box without it just skips the HAVE_JJ-gated aliases. Packaged on Arch (jujutsu), openSUSE (jujutsu), Gentoo (dev-vcs/jujutsu), Fedora (jujutsu), Homebrew (jj) and nixpkgs (jujutsu); not in Alpine (musl — cargo install jujutsu) or stable Debian/Kali apt (cargo install jujutsu) — same cargo pattern as yazi/ouch. The config (jujutsu/config.toml) is inert without the binary. ⁹ sesh: smart tmux session manager that Core already drives from the Ctrl-G shell widget (fzf.zsh) and the prefix + f tmux popup (tmux-sesh.sh); both degrade to a find+fzf sessionizer when it’s absent. core-doctor already reports sesh via its own command -v probe (it does not read HAVE_SESH); tools.zsh now also sets HAVE_SESH for parity with the other detected tools. Packaged in the AUR (sesh), Homebrew (sesh), and nixpkgs (sesh); not in Arch-official, openSUSE, Alpine, Gentoo, Fedora, or Debian/Kali apt — so most of the fleet uses go install github.com/joshmedeski/sesh/v2@latest (note the v2 module path), the same build path as starship/yazi/atuin where unpackaged. go is already a pinned mise runtime, so the install works everywhere; mise use -g go first on a bare box. The seeded sesh/sesh.toml.example config is inert without the binary.

Clipboard backend (swap in os/<distro>.zsh)

Distro quirks worth a README note (and that will actually bite you)

Arch — Rolling release; update often or not at all (partial upgrades break things — never -Sy <pkg> without -u). Most modern tools are in official repos; the rest are one paru -S away in the AUR. Enable multilib if you’ll run 32-bit/Wine tooling. Cleanest distro for this stack.

openSUSE — Two flavors, and the update command differs: Tumbleweed (rolling) uses zypper dup, Leap (stable) uses zypper up. Get this wrong and you either don’t update or you half-update. Add the Packman repo (the openSUSE analog to RPM Fusion) for codecs. zypper has the best dependency solver of any of these — lean on it.

Alpine — The real outlier: musl libc, not glibc. Prebuilt binaries linked against glibc (some cargo-less installer scripts, some vendor blobs) will not run — prefer apk packages or musl-target builds. Default shell is ash (busybox), default privilege tool is doas (not sudo), and many “classic” commands are busybox applets with fewer flags. This is your small-footprint / container / rescue-disk distro — keep its layer lean and don’t fight the musl grain.

Gentoo — Source-based: emerge compiles packages, so expect real build time (mitigate with binary packages via a binhost, and tune MAKEOPTS). USE flags gate features at compile time — this is the whole point of Gentoo and where the learning is. Tool names are full atoms (category/name). Treat this repo as your “understand the system from the ground up” build; it’s the most educational and the most time-expensive.

Kali (WSL2) — The one repo that isn’t stamped from Fedora: it’s Debian-family (apt) and carries a unique offensive role layer on top of the usual OS layer, adding an offensive stage to the zsh loader (… os offensive local). Two things actually bite. (1) Debian renames binaries — bat→batcat, and the fd-find package installs fdfind; Core handles both. (2) WSL2 is NAT’d, so a listener or reverse shell in Kali isn’t reachable from your LAN until you enable mirrored networking — which lives in the Windows-side %UserProfile%\.wslconfig (networkingMode=mirrored, Win11 22H2+), not /etc/wsl.conf. Keep all engagement data in ~/engagements (outside the repo); the repo ships a paranoid .gitignore as backup.

Repo status

• Built: core, Fedora (template), MacBook, Arch, openSUSE, Alpine, Gentoo, Kali.
• Stamp-pending (this doc): none — all four template stamps are complete.
• Kali (apt + offensive layer) and MacBook (Homebrew) are their own lineages, built directly rather than stamped from Fedora. Windows is tracked separately from this matrix.

Stamping order (all complete — kept as the recommended sequence for reference)

1. Arch ✓ — almost everything is in-repo; closest to Fedora effort.
2. openSUSE ✓ — straightforward once you internalize dup vs up.
3. Alpine ✓ — forces you to reason about musl and minimalism (great for the container/rescue skills a red-teamer wants).
4. Gentoo ✓ — the capstone; USE flags + source builds teach you the most.