install the tmux config where tmux actually reads it

tmux 3.1 added an XDG location and it takes PRECEDENCE over ~/.tmux.conf.
Verified on 3.4 here by writing a different marker into each and asking tmux
which one it ended up with:

  both present       -> ~/.config/tmux/tmux.conf
  only ~/.tmux.conf  -> ~/.tmux.conf
  only the XDG one   -> the XDG one

So the Shell section writing ~/.tmux.conf on a machine that already has the XDG
file produced a file tmux will never read, and reported "tmux config installed"
having changed nothing anybody could observe. That is the worst shape a config
step can have: it looks done.

tmux_config_target now picks the path tmux will actually load — the existing XDG
file if there is one, otherwise ~/.tmux.conf, which is still what every guide
names and what a machine with neither should get. When both exist the section
says so out loud before targeting the winner, because "your other file wins" is
not something anyone infers from a success message.

Also removed an untracked duplicate at scripts/setup/.tmux.conf. The one the
script installs is scripts/setup/machine-setup/.tmux.conf — SCRIPT_DIR is the
machine-setup directory — and two identical copies with only one of them read is
the drift this whole evening has been about.

Nothing to change about the config itself: the tracked copy is already byte-for-
byte the owner's own ~/.tmux.conf.

Not yet wired into per-user provisioning. src/servers/shell-skel/ seeds a zshrc
for a member and has no tmux config beside it.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
This commit is contained in:
2026-08-13 02:43:08 +00:00
co-authored by Claude Opus 5
parent 085afe7604
commit 61a3ae720f
2 changed files with 48 additions and 3 deletions
+35
View File
@@ -125,3 +125,38 @@ append_once() {
echo "$end" echo "$end"
} >>"$file" } >>"$file"
} }
# -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
# Where tmux actually reads its config
# -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
#
# tmux 3.1 added an XDG location and it takes PRECEDENCE. Verified on 3.4 by
# creating both and asking tmux which marker it ended up with:
#
# both present -> ~/.config/tmux/tmux.conf
# only ~/.tmux.conf -> ~/.tmux.conf
# only the XDG one -> the XDG one
#
# So installing to ~/.tmux.conf on a machine that has the XDG file writes a file
# tmux will never read, and the script would report success having changed
# nothing anybody can see. That is the failure this exists to prevent.
#
# Rules, in order:
# 1. an existing XDG config wins -> that is their real config, target it
# 2. an existing ~/.tmux.conf -> target it, since it is what tmux reads
# 3. neither -> ~/.tmux.conf, the path every guide names
tmux_config_target() {
local home="$1"
local xdg="${XDG_CONFIG_HOME:-$home/.config}/tmux/tmux.conf"
if [[ -f "$xdg" ]]; then
echo "$xdg"
else
echo "$home/.tmux.conf"
fi
}
# True when a ~/.tmux.conf would be shadowed by an XDG config that already exists.
tmux_dot_conf_is_shadowed() {
local home="$1"
[[ -f "${XDG_CONFIG_HOME:-$home/.config}/tmux/tmux.conf" && -f "$home/.tmux.conf" ]]
}
+13 -3
View File
@@ -2226,10 +2226,20 @@ if ! skip; then
fi fi
if [[ -r "$SCRIPT_DIR/.tmux.conf" ]]; then if [[ -r "$SCRIPT_DIR/.tmux.conf" ]]; then
install_config "$SCRIPT_DIR/.tmux.conf" "${USER_HOME}/.tmux.conf" "$USERNAME" && RC=0 || RC=$? # Not always ~/.tmux.conf — see tmux_config_target. tmux 3.1+ prefers
# ~/.config/tmux/tmux.conf, so writing the old path on a machine that has
# the new one produces a file tmux never reads and a success message that
# means nothing.
TMUX_TARGET="$(tmux_config_target "$USER_HOME")"
if tmux_dot_conf_is_shadowed "$USER_HOME"; then
warn "you have BOTH ~/.tmux.conf and ~/.config/tmux/tmux.conf — tmux reads the second"
echo " Targeting the one it actually reads: ${TMUX_TARGET}"
fi
install -d -m 0755 -o "$USERNAME" -g "$(user_group)" "$(dirname "$TMUX_TARGET")"
install_config "$SCRIPT_DIR/.tmux.conf" "$TMUX_TARGET" "$USERNAME" && RC=0 || RC=$?
case $RC in case $RC in
0) ok "tmux config installed" ;; 0) ok "tmux config installed${TMUX_TARGET}" ;;
1) echo " tmux config already matches" ;; 1) echo " tmux config already matches (${TMUX_TARGET})" ;;
esac esac
fi fi