The Minimalist Terminal Setup
Tags: setup, themes, colorschemes, editor
Published: 2019-06-06 12:25:52

---
title: The Minimalist Terminal Setup 
published: true
description: A very simple yet elegant and powerful terminal setup.
tags: setup, themes, colorschemes, editor
---

**TL;DR** Alacritty + Tmux + Vim 

I find the beauty of a development environment in its simplicity. How much an IDE or setup can do without external plugins is their true extent of utility.

I love minimalist setups, I don't like bloating the software with external plugins and themes just to make it look pretty. A config file saved somewhere in `/home` directory is more elegant than GUI or Wizard. If you are like me, you will also love this minimalist terminal setup.

![terminal screenshot](https://i.imgur.com/tG4iJHH.png)

# Alacritty

Alacritty is nothing but a terminal emulator. It does not have features that you'll generally find in an interactive terminal emulator. List all the things it **does not have**.

- Multiple tabs
- Preference Wizard
- Package Manager(of any kind)
- Built-in themes
- No GUI settings window of any kind.

List of things **it is**.

- Fast
- Simple
- Independent
- Extensible
- < 2.0 MB size

[Alacritty is faster than any interactive terminal apps](https://github.com/jwilm/alacritty#faq). It does not require extra setup or dependency to run. It can also apply settings from existing configuration files i.e. `.bashrc`, `.profile` etc.

#### Configurations

- **Color schemes**: Open the `alacritty.yml` file located at `~/.config/alacritty/alacritty.yml` move to the `colors: ` variable. Change the respective color values to your liking. You can also visit this [wiki](https://github.com/jwilm/alacritty/wiki/Color-schemes) to copy some cool color values.
```yml
# Colors (Ayu Dark)
colors:
  # Default colors
  primary:
    background: '0x0A0E14'
    foreground: '0xB3B1AD'

  # Normal colors
  normal:
    black: '0x01060E'
    red: '0xEA6C73'
    green: '0x91B362'
    yellow: '0xF9AF4F'
    blue: '0x53BDFA'
    magenta: '0xFAE994'
    cyan: '0x90E1C6'
    white: '0xC7C7C7'

  # Bright colors
  bright:
    black: '0x686868'
    red: '0xF07178'
    green: '0xC2D94C'
    yellow: '0xFFB454'
    blue: '0x59C2FF'
    magenta: '0xFFEE99'
    cyan: '0x95E6CB'
    white: '0xFFFFFF'
```

- **Fonts**: In the same config file, move to the `font: ` variable, under `normal: ` variable and uncomment `family: ` append your favorite font name and style.
```yml
font:
  # Normal (roman) font face
  normal:
    # Font family
    #
    # Default:
    #   - (macOS) Menlo
    #   - (Linux) monospace
    #   - (Windows) Consolas
    family: 'SF Mono'

    # The `style` can be specified to pick a specific face.
    style: Regular
```

- **Font Size**: In the config file, move to `size: ` variable and change the value, make sure you add `.0` decimal after the integer.
```yml
  # Point size
  size: 11.0
```

- **Line Height**: In the config file, `offset: ` variable have two sub variables `x` and `y`, where `y` can be called as line height and `x` as the letter spacing.
```yml
  offset:
    x: 0
    y: 0
```

#### Download

Alacritty is available for almost all the major platforms Linux, BSD, Windows, Mac etc. It is also available as bash file. You can download binaries and package files [here](https://github.com/jwilm/alacritty/releases/tag/v0.3.2).

# Tmux

![tmux screenshot](https://i.imgur.com/V8X9SX3.png)

Something crucial that Alacritty does not have are tabs. We need tabs. We love leaving things on them tabs and `CMD + T` onto next ones.

The solution to tabs in Alacritty is Tmux. Tmux is command line based window and session manager. With its key bindings Tmux becomes very powerful. You can simultaneously open up multiple sessions and leave jobs running until you visit them next time.


#### Download

Tmux can be directly downloaded from [github](https://github.com/tmux/tmux/releases) or you can install it via package manager.

# Vim

At last, Vim. It needs no introduction. I do not use any vim plugins other than color scheme files.

# My settings

I've spent a great amount of time researching configuration options, color schemes and other settings so you don't have to. I have saved all my settings on my github [ap4gh/settings](https://github.com/ap4gh/settings) repository. Just copy-paste them at their respective places.

#### Troubleshooting

Some vim config may misbehave. But don't worry I am here to help you out. Just send a message on my [twitter](https://twitter.com/ok_ape).

Read next: [The easiest way to create a blog with Gatsby](https://www.diaryofdev.com/how-I-created-devdiary-blog-20190126/)