GNU Stow

stow

A symlink farm manager which takes distinct packages of software located in separate directories and makes them appear installed in one place.

Runs as stow|macOS, Linux, Windows|www.gnu.org

Open form in Otty otty.toml

Command form

ai-draft · 3 tasks · 11 fields

Symlink, unstow or restow packages from a stow directory. Version and help flags are left out.

Opens the form; the finished command lands at your prompt, unrun

Run in Otty

otty gui stow

Stow packagesExample values, fixed in this page — nothing here reaches a terminal

Basic

Packages*

string

Stow directory

directory

Dry run

--no

Dotfiles

--dotfiles

TasksEach one presets the form for one job

Stow packages

packagesdirtargetsimulatedotfiles

Unstow packages

packagesdirtargetsimulatedelete

Restow packages

packagesdirtargetsimulaterestowdotfiles

ParametersOnly these flags are editable in the form

Packages

Package directories inside the stow directory.
string · positional 0 · repeatable

Stow directory

Defaults to the current directory.
path

--dir-d

Target directory

Defaults to the parent of the stow directory.
path

--target-t

Dry run

Show what would happen without changing the filesystem.
boolean

--no-n

Unstow

Remove the packages from the target directory.
boolean

--delete-D

Restow

Unstow then stow again, pruning obsolete links.
boolean

--restow-R

Dotfiles

Rename dot-prefixed entries in packages to hidden files.
boolean

--dotfiles

No folding

boolean

--no-folding

Adopt existing files

Moves existing target files into the stow directory.
boolean

--adopt

Ignore pattern

Perl regex of file name endings to ignore.
string · repeatable

--ignore

Verbosity

0 to 5.
integer

--verbose

SourcesEvery flag above is checked against these

fig

completion

github.com

Before it fills your prompt, Otty checks the installed stow against its version. A form that does not match your version is not offered.