DEV Community

Cover image for I Built a One-Command macOS Terminal Setup — Ghostty + Zsh + 30 Modern CLI Tools
satyamsoni2211
satyamsoni2211

Posted on

I Built a One-Command macOS Terminal Setup — Ghostty + Zsh + 30 Modern CLI Tools

#terminal #macos #productivity #opensource

Every time I set up a new Mac, I'd spend half a day doing the same thing — installing Homebrew, picking a terminal, configuring Zsh plugins, hunting for that one tool I forgot the name of, fixing a broken .zshrc. It was tedious, error-prone, and felt like something a script could handle.

So I built dev-accelerator — a one-command macOS terminal setup that gets you from a fresh Mac to a fully productive terminal environment in minutes.

What it sets up 

╭─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮
│  dev-accelerator  ─  Ghostty + Zsh + 30 modern CLI tools                │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│                                                                          │
│  ❯ ls                                                                    │
│  󰉋 src/   󰉋 tests/   󰉋 docs/    setup.sh   install.sh   README.md      │
│                                                                          │
│  ❯ git log --oneline                                                     │
│  a3f1c2e  feat: add zoxide smart cd integration                          │
│  b89d041  fix: backup .zshrc before modification                         │
│                                                                          │
│  satyam@macbook  ~/projects/dev-accelerator  main ✓  took 0.3s          │
╰─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Here's the full picture of what gets installed and configured:

  • Ghostty — a GPU-accelerated terminal emulator, pre-configured with the Catppuccin theme
  • Zsh with zsh-autosuggestions and zsh-syntax-highlighting
  • Starship prompt using the gruvbox-rainbow preset
  • Atuin — shell history that syncs across machines and is actually searchable
  • Zoxide — a smarter cd that learns your most-visited directories
  • FZF — fuzzy finder wired into your shell for files, history, and more
  • Mise — a single runtime version manager replacing nvm, pyenv, and rbenv

Plus a full suite of modern CLI replacements for the outdated Unix defaults you've been living with.

Modern CLI tools: out with the old

One of the best parts of this setup is swapping out stale Unix tools for modern, faster, friendlier alternatives:

Old tool New tool Why it's better
ls eza Icons, git status, tree view
cat bat Syntax highlighting, line numbers, git diff
grep ripgrep 10–100x faster, respects .gitignore
find fd Simpler syntax, faster, colorized output
cd zoxide Learns your habits, jump with z proj
top bottom (btm) Beautiful TUI with graphs
ps procs Human-readable, colorized, searchable
man tealdeer Practical examples instead of dense manpages
git CLI lazygit / gitui Full TUI git workflows
tar/zip ouch One tool for all archive formats

One command to rule them all 

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/satyamsoni2211/dev-accelerator/main/install.sh | bash
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

That's it. The script:

  1. Checks if Homebrew is installed — installs it if not
  2. Dynamically checks which packages are already installed — skips them
  3. Configures Zsh with all plugins
  4. Sets up the Starship prompt
  5. Creates the Ghostty config with Catppuccin theme
  6. Backs up your existing .zshrc before touching anything
  7. Sets Zsh as your default shell

The "backs up your .zshrc" part matters — I've seen too many setup scripts that just overwrite your config without asking.

Two ways to install

Not everyone wants to pipe a script into bash (fair!), so there's also a manual option:

Option 1: One-click (above)

Best for getting started fast on a new machine.

Option 2: Homebrew + setup script 

git clone https://github.com/satyamsoni2211/dev-accelerator.git
cd dev-accelerator
./setup.sh
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Gives you an interactive prompt to choose what to install.

2025/2026 tools worth knowing

Beyond the classics, the setup also includes some newer tools that have become part of my daily workflow:

  • Zellij — a terminal workspace (tmux alternative) with a much friendlier UX and built-in layouts
  • delta — a git diff pager with syntax highlighting that makes reviewing changes actually pleasant
  • tokei — counts lines of code by language, blazing fast
  • uv — the new standard for Python package management; it's dramatically faster than pip
  • direnv — automatically loads .env files when you enter a directory, unloads when you leave

What's next

A few things I'm planning to add:

  • Linux support (Ubuntu/Debian)
  • Neovim pre-configuration as an optional module
  • A --minimal flag for the install script (just shell + core tools, no terminal emulator)
  • iTerm2 as an alternative to Ghostty for those who prefer it

Give it a try

The project is open source under the MIT license.

👉 github.com/satyamsoni2211/dev-accelerator

If you try it out, I'd love to hear what tools you'd add or what your current setup looks like. And if you find a bug, issues and PRs are very welcome — see CONTRIBUTING.md to get started.

What's your go-to terminal tool that most developers haven't heard of? Drop it in the comments — I'm always looking for new additions.

Top comments (0)