alt-tab-macos VS homebrew-bundle

> - Can't tab cycle through minimized windows

> - Windowing system sucks compared to Windows

Checkout: https://github.com/lwouis/alt-tab-macos solved most of my pains with it.

I use AltTab [0] for this. I find using a mac without it horrendous.

[0]: https://alt-tab-macos.netlify.app/

I know of this app which allows you to port that functionality: https://alt-tab-macos.netlify.app/

Disclaimer: I have never used it, one of my colleagues mentioned it a while ago.

If you're using a Mac, I really recommend alt-tab https://alt-tab-macos.netlify.app/.

I love cmd+tab on a mac to switch between applications, but I was missing a feature to switch between windows of the same application. Alt+tab solves that in the same manner Windows does.

I know this isn’t the point of your post, but in case it helps your experience in MacOS:

1. You can change the setting so that workspaces do not change their position/order. See: https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/214348/how-to-prev...

2. The third party app “alt-tab” provides an alt tab experience that is much better than the native one, and is likely more similar to the behavior you expect from Linux. See: https://alt-tab-macos.netlify.app

I also personally like to use Rectangle for window positioning using keyboard shortcuts, tried the various auto tiling solutions like yabai and amethyst in the past but I think the flexibility of Rectangle is worth having to remember and use a few keyboard shortcuts.

I think it’s unfortunate that so many third party apps are required, but with a bit of babysitting MacOS can be pretty decent to work with.

AltTab MacOS app

There's likely a delay so that you can use Alt-Tab to quickly go back to your last window without the pop-up showing. I use AltTab on macOS like this, which has a configurable delay.

https://alt-tab-macos.netlify.app/

I maintain a Brewfile (https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-bundle) which contains the majority of the non-project specific applications that I like to install on any new Mac:

https://github.com/jonahgeorge/dotfiles/tree/main

What's really nice is the `cask` & `mas` keywords allow you to install .dmg files & directly from the App Store.

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While its not included in there yet, I've been experimenting with maintaining a private Homebrew tap which contains my ~/bin directory as opposed to shell aliases.

> It's strange that people are so against declarative systems, or even file-based OS configuration. When I get my new Macbook I was up-and-running within a few minutes. I can't imagine maintaining a list of brews I need to re-install just to set up everything + my configs + everything else.

I haven’t had time to try Nix yet, but HomeBrew does have a declarative-ish workflow that I’ve been using for years:

[Brew Bundle](https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-bundle) let’s you have a plaintext file listing all packages you want installed on your system. Add a line for stuff you want installed, delete a line for stuff you want removed, invoke it the right way and it will install/remove packages until your system matches the list. The initial list can be generated by “brew bundle dump” or something like that.

For configuration, I find that a normal dotfile repo cloned into my ~/.config (with a script that maintains symlinks to config files in e.g. ~/Library) works well enough for my use.

Brew supports dumping installed things into a brewfile: https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-bundle

I was using text files before as well to manage it.

Assuming everyone's on a Mac, I'm actually surprised there isn't that much use of something like homebrew-bundle[1]. It's definitely nicer to have your tooling run natively rather than, say, trying to wrap everything in Docker, or trying to get everybody on board with nix or guix.

I think the only real issue here is that you can't really pin to specific versions unless a formula exists, and there is no guarantee that a formula with a pinned version will stick around because homebrew likes to stay lean.

[1]https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-bundle/

You should checkout Homebrew bundle and create a Brewfile instead. That will let you install both stuff from brew, casks and Mac AppStore apps in one go.

If you use brew bundle and create your own Brewfile, you can store this with your personal dot files and automate bootstrapping (auto-installing all your system tools) a new or recently reformatted Mac by including auto-trader-pro in your Brewfile.

And if you're already loving Homebrew, definitely check out Homebrew Bundle!

If you like homebrew, definitely give homebrew bundle a whirl if you haven't already