The easiest way to version control your dotfiles.

1. Initialize empty repo at home

git init --bare $HOME/.dotfiles

2. Use working directory of git as $HOME, and git dir as .dotfiles

alias config='/usr/bin/git --git-dir=$HOME/.dotfiles/ --work-tree=$HOME'

3. Only for current local repo, because it's annoying.

config config status.showUntrackedFiles no

4. Here you go, check status, add your configs, and commit.

config status
config add .config/mpv
config commit -m "Added mpv config"

5. Create repo at github/gitlab and add origin -> Push.

config remote add origin <link>
config push origin master

Here you can use different branches for different computers, you can replicate you configuration easily on new installation -

For using dotfiles on other device

1. Clone repo into home, if its empty

git clone --separate-git-dir=~/.myconf <link-to-repo> ~

2. Or clone into separate tmp dir, otherwise it will fail if your home directory isn't empty. Then copy your configs and remove tmp dir.

git clone --separate-git-dir=$HOME/.dotfiles <link-to-repo> $HOME/dotfiles-tmp
cp ~/dotfiles-tmp/.vimrc ~
rm -r ~/myconf-tmp/

3. Again set alias to manage dotfiles.

alias config='/usr/bin/git --git-dir=$HOME/.dotfiles/ --work-tree=$HOME'

Done! easy peezy lemon squeezy :)

Reference: ArchWiki | Ycombinator