Explain before_ and after_ with a better example than current docs

[xuanswe]

Hello,

I am new to chezmoi and read this in docs:

Scripts are normally run while chezmoi updates your dotfiles. For example, run_b.sh will be run after updating a.txt and before updating c.txt. To run scripts before or after the updates, use the before_ or after_ attributes, respectively, e.g., run_once_before_install-password-manager.sh.

This paragraph is not so clear to me.

I understand that run_once_before_install-password-manager.sh will be run before something. But before what? What is install-password-manager in this context?

There are 2 completely examples in this paragraph and I don't really how they are connected.

For example,

• I have a file <repo>/dot_local/share/applications/executable_idea-ultimate.desktop
• I want to run a script after the file ~/.local/share/applications/idea-ultimate.desktop is created
• What should be the correct name of the script?

Thanks!

[bradenhilton]

Perhaps the application order will help here.

[xuanswe]

Thanks for the link.

From the link you mentioned, I understand that: the name of script doesn't matter, except its attributes.

For example, if we have 3 files: executable_idea-ultimate.desktop, run_before_whatever-we-want.sh and run_after_whatever-we-want.sh.

The order is always as below:

• Run the script run_before_whatever-we-want.sh
• Copy the file executable_idea-ultimate.desktop to destination
• Run the script run_after_whatever-we-want.sh

before_ and after_ is a global phase that is independent of the non-script files.

Is that correct?

[halostatue]

Correct. There is no way to execute something immediately before or after applying a single file during a normal apply.

[halostatue]

One other note: the name of the script matters for sort order. The scripts are run in roughly lexical order (alphabetic-ish) but scripts in other directories will take the full path in consideration.

[xuanswe]

Thank you, @bradenhilton, @halostatue!

I understand now.