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Fresh Mac Setup
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cmal-fresh-mac-setup.md

New Computer Setup

Last tested using Mac OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion

Setup Dropbox

Copy Dropbox folder from previous drive to user folder

Install Dropbox

General Setup

Remove unused items from Dock

Add Applications folder to dock and set it to display as "Grid"

Manually add in-progress project folders to Finder sidebar

System Settings

Mission Control: Set Mission control to fn key (laptop only)

Mission Control: Set Mission control to Mouse Button 4 (Logitech mouse thumb button)

Mission Control: Set bottom right corner to "Show Desktop"

Desktop & Screen Saver > Screensaver > Hot Corners: Bottom left starts screensaver.

Spotlight: Disable Spotlight keyboard shortcuts

Dock: Automatically hide and show the dock

Security & Privacy > General: Require password 1 minute after sleep or screensaver begins.

Security & Privacy > General: Allow applications downloaded from: Anywhere

Mouse: Set tracking speed to highest

Trackpad: Turn off "Scroll direction: natural"

iCloud: Turn on "Back to My Mac"

Bluetooth: Turn off "Show Bluetooth in Menu Bar"

Date & Time: Clock > Don't Show the day of the week

Date & Time: Clock > Show date

Users & Groups: Set account photo to not be an animal, plant, or piece of sporting equipment

Finder Preferences:

General: Show "Hard disks" and "Connected servers" on the Desktop

General: "New Finder windows show:" Dropbox folder

General: "Spring-loaded folders and windows" delay to "Short"

Sidebar: Disable the following

  • All My Files
  • AirDrop
  • Documents
  • Movies
  • Music
  • Pictures

Sidebar: Enable User Folder

Advanced: "When performing a search: Search the Current Folder"

Install from the Mac App Store:

  • Cloud
  • Fantastical
  • xScope
  • Evernote
  • Xcode
  • Reeder
  • Moom

Setup 1Password:

Install 1Password

Tell it to use the existing file in your Dropbox

Install Browser Extensions

Preferences > Security: Lock after 480 minutes of computer inactivity

Preferences > Security > Lock when sleeping: Off

Preferences > Security > Lock when screen saver is active: Off

Preferences > Security > Disable automatic unlock for 1Password: Off

Preferences > Logins: Submit Automatically after filling a login: On

Setup Alfred:

Install Alfred

Activate Powerpack

Enable 1Password Bookmarks and "Show in default results without keyword"

Set "Alfred hotkey" to Cmd-Space

Features > Clipboard: Remove the default keyboard shortcut for Viewer Hotkey

Appearance: Hide menu bar icon

Advanced: Set "Settings Folder" to use Dropbox/Config/Alfred

Setup SublimeText:

Install SublimeText

Install Sublime Package Control

Install Soda Theme via Package Control

Install Emmet via Package Control

Install CoffeeScript via Package Control

Install Gist via Package Control

Create symlinks for user preferences: rm -r -f /Users/cmalven/Library/Application\ Support/Sublime\ Text\ 3/Packages ln -s -f /Users/cmalven/Dropbox/Config/sublime-text/Packages /Users/cmalven/Library/Application\ Support/Sublime\ Text\ 3/

rm -r -f /Users/cmalven/Library/Application\ Support/Sublime\ Text\ 3/Installed\ Packages ln -s -f /Users/cmalven/Dropbox/Config/sublime-text/Installed\ Packages /Users/cmalven/Library/Application\ Support/Sublime\ Text\ 3/

Add terminal shortcut: ln -s "/Applications/Sublime Text.app/Contents/SharedSupport/bin/subl" /usr/local/bin/sublime

Setup TotalFinder:

Install TotalFinder

Turn on Visor

Set Visor activation keyboard shortcut to option-tab

Turn off animations for Visor

Tweaks: Show System Files

Tweaks: Folders on Top

Tweaks: Hide icon in Menu Bar

Setup Dev Environment:

Safari > Preferences > Advanced: Show Develop menu in menu bar

Install Xcode via the Mac App Store

In Xcode > Preferences > Downloads install Command Line Tools

In Xcode > Preferences > Downloads install iOS Simulator

Install Homebrew ruby -e "$(curl -fsSkL raw.github.com/mxcl/homebrew/go)"

Install Git brew install git

Install node.js

Install Meteor

Open LiveReload and install Safari and Chrome Browser Extensions

Add SSH Key

cd ~/.ssh

ssh-keygen -t rsa -C "[email protected]"

pbcopy < ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub

Sign in to GitHub, goto Account Settings and replace your old ssh key with the new one copied to your clipboard by the above command.

You'll also need to add this key to other services, such as Heroku.

Setup RVM and Gems:

Install RVM & Rails \curl -L https://get.rvm.io | bash -s stable --rails

Set default RVM Ruby and Gemset rvm use 1.9.3@global --default

gem install sass

gem install compass

Setup Terminal:

Install zsh: curl -L https://github.com/robbyrussell/oh-my-zsh/raw/master/tools/install.sh | sh

Download Solarized and open /solarized/osx-terminal.app-colors-solarized/osx-terminal.app-colors-solarized

Create a symlink for your zsh theme: ln -s /Users/cmalven/Dropbox/Config/zsh/cmal.zsh-theme /Users/cmalven/.oh-my-zsh/themes

Create a symlink for your .zshrc file: ln -s -f /Users/cmalven/Dropbox/Config/zsh/.zshrc /Users/cmalven

Create a symlink for your .zshenv file: ln -s -f /Users/cmalven/Dropbox/Config/zsh/.zshenv /Users/cmalven

Create a symlink for your zsh customization: rm -r /Users/cmalven/.oh-my-zsh/custom && ln -s /Users/cmalven/Dropbox/Config/zsh/custom /Users/cmalven/.oh-my-zsh

Open Terminal preferences and select Solarized Dark as color scheme.

Position and resize the open Terminal window to set the default.

Shell > Use Settings as Default

Setup MAMP:

Download and Install MAMP Pro

Open MAMP Pro

Under Server > General, change the Apache port to 80 and the MySQL port to 3306

Now we need to sync our databases and hosts with Dropbox. Make sure the MAMP server isn't running and MAMP is closed, then:

rm -rf /Library/Application\ Support/appsolute/MAMP\ PRO/conf
rm -rf /Users/cmalven/Library/Application\ Support/appsolute
ln -s /Users/cmalven/Dropbox/Config/mamp/appsolute /Users/cmalven/Library/Application\ Support
ln -s /Users/cmalven/Dropbox/Config/mamp/conf /Library/Application\ Support/appsolute/MAMP\ PRO

Setup Adobe Creative Suite

Download and install Adobe Application Manager

Using Adobe Application Manager, install the following:

  • Photoshop
  • After Effects
  • InDesign
  • Illustrator
  • Adobe Acrobat

Add Photoshop and Illustrator to the dock.

Setup Adobe Illustrator

Preferences > Units: General > Pixels

Preferences > User Interface: 100% Light

Collapse Toolbar to single column

Combine and dock palettes to right edge of screen in this order:

  • Appearance / Attributes
  • Stroke (Show Options ON)
  • Color (Show Options ON)
  • Swatches
  • Transparency (Hide Thumbnails ON)
  • Symbols
  • Pathfinder / Align / Transform
  • Layers / Artboards

On Desktop screen, every pallette should be expanded at all times. On laptop screen they should be collapsed to a single column of icons.

Remove Illustrator default scripts: rm -f -r /Applications/Adobe\ Illustrator\ CC/Presets.localized/en_US/Scripts

Symlink Illustrator scripts: ln -s -f /Users/cmalven/Dropbox/Config/illustrator/Scripts /Applications/Adobe\ Illustrator\ CC/Presets.localized/en_US

Symlink Illustrator templates: ln -s -f /Users/cmalven/Dropbox/Config/illustrator/Custom\ Templates /Applications/Adobe\ Illustrator\ CC/Cool\ Extras.localized/en_US/Templates

Window > Workspace > New Workspace > cmal

Edit > Color Settings: Under Working Spaces set RGB to Monitor RGB - Display. Under Color Management Policies set RGB to Off. For Profile Mismatches choose Ask When Opening.

Quit and reopen Illustrator to look in Preferences, otherwise it will reset them when it inevitably crashes.

Setup Photoshop

Download and install Bjango Actions

From Layers palette, open Panel Options and disable Expand new Effects and Add "copy" to Copied Layers and Groups

Edit > Color Settings: Under Working Spaces set RGB to Monitor RGB - Display. Under Color Management Policies set RGB to Off. For Profile Mismatches choose Ask When Opening.

Photoshop > Preferences > Units & Rulers: Set Units to Pixels

Setup Fonts

Download FontExplorerX

Check "Organize Font Files" and set location to /Dropbox/Config/FontExplorer X/Font Library

Preferences > General: Open FontExplorer X Pro automatically at login

Drag /Dropbox/Config/FontExplorer X/Font Library/ into FontExplorerX to add font collection.

Setup OmniGraffle

Install OmniGraffle

Remove existing Stencil folder: rm -r -f /Users/cmalven/Library/Application\ Support/The\ Omni\ Group/OmniGraffle/Stencils

Symlink Stencils to Dropbox: ln -s /Users/cmalven/Dropbox/Config/omnigraffle/Stencils /Users/cmalven/Library/Application\ Support/The\ Omni\ Group/OmniGraffle

Remove existing Diagram Style folder: rm -r -f /Users/cmalven/Library/Application\ Support/The\ Omni\ Group/OmniGraffle/Diagram\ Styles

Symlink Diagram Styles to Dropbox: ln -s /Users/cmalven/Dropbox/Config/omnigraffle/Diagram\ Styles /Users/cmalven/Library/Application\ Support/The\ Omni\ Group/OmniGraffle

Setup Mail

On a previous computer/drive copy /user/Library/Mail to your new computer.

On a previous computer/drive copy /user/Library/Preferences/com.apple.mail.plist to your new computer.

Copy these folders to the respective locations on your new Mac/Drive.

Open Mail

Mail > Preferences > Viewing: Show contact photos in the message list

Install other Applications:

@bernsno
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bernsno commented Nov 10, 2012

I added "backup .ssh directory" to my fork of this gist. I'll continue to update that as I work through this today.

@eboyer
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eboyer commented Nov 25, 2012

Dudes. I like this!

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