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New Development Environment Setup

Medium 20 items · 2 hours
testuser's avatar
testuser Published 4 weeks ago
Technical

This checklist walks new developers through setting up a secure, productive development environment on their machine. It’s for developers of all levels who want a repeatable setup covering tools, version managers, IDEs, SSH, Git, and dotfiles.

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  1. Install OS updates and security patches — Run system update tools and reboot if required to apply patches.
  2. Set up a package manager — Use a platform package manager to simplify installing tools.
  3. Install Homebrew (macOS) — Run the Homebrew install script: /bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/HEAD/install.sh)"
  4. Install Chocolatey (Windows) — Install via PowerShell with admin rights: Set-ExecutionPolicy Bypass; iex ((New-Object System.Net.WebClient).DownloadString('https://chocolatey.org/install.ps1'))
  5. Ensure apt/yum repos and build tools (Linux) — Update package lists and install build-essential, git, curl or distro equivalents.
  6. Install version managers for runtimes — Use tools like nvm, pyenv, rbenv to manage language versions per project.
  7. Install nvm (Node version manager) — Follow nvm install script and add source lines to your shell profile.
  8. Install pyenv (Python version manager) — Install pyenv and required build deps, then add initialization to your shell.
  9. Install core development tools (Git, curl, build tools) — Install Git, curl, compilers and other essentials via your package manager.
  10. Configure Git global settings (name, email, default branch) — Set git config --global user.name, user.email, init.defaultBranch and core.editor.
  11. Generate SSH key and add it to the SSH agent — Use ssh-keygen -t ed25519 (or rsa) and ssh-add to load the key into your agent.
  12. Add your SSH public key to your Git provider account — Copy ~/.ssh/id_*pub and paste into GitHub/GitLab/Bitbucket SSH keys settings.
  13. Install Docker and run a test container — Install Docker Desktop or engine and run docker run hello-world to verify.
  14. Install your preferred IDE/editor and essential extensions — Install VS Code, JetBrains IDEs, or others and add extensions for linting and formatting.
  15. Clone or create dotfiles and symlink config files — Keep dotfiles in a repo and symlink .gitconfig, .bashrc/.zshrc, and editor settings.
  16. Configure shell environment and install Oh My Zsh (optional) — Set PATH, aliases, and source your profile; install Oh My Zsh for zsh users.
  17. Install language runtimes and set project default versions — Use nvm/pyenv to install specific Node/Python versions required by projects.
  18. Install global developer tools and linters (prettier, eslint, black) — Install CLI tools globally or per-project; verify their versions and configs.
  19. Set up local databases and services using Docker Compose — Bring up Postgres, Redis, or other services with docker-compose for local dev.
  20. Create README with environment setup notes and start scripts — Document required env vars, commands, and how to start services for new devs.
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