| name | audit |
| description | Dotfiles health baseline and triage. Use when the user wants a whole-system audit of ~/.dotfiles: credential leaks, shell startup, Stow symlinks, Neovim startup, missing tools, or orphan config. Do not use for targeted Neovim or shell edits; route those to neovim or shell-env. |
| user-invocable | true |
Dotfiles Audit
Full health check of the dotfiles setup. Run all steps in order — each takes seconds and together they give a complete picture.
Security check runs first: it's always highest priority.
Step 0: Security Scan
Scan for credentials before anything else.
grep -rE "(API_KEY|TOKEN|SECRET|PASSWORD)\s*=\s*['\"][^'\"]+['\"]" ~/.dotfiles/ 2>/dev/null
grep -rE "(ghp_|sk-|AKIA|-----BEGIN.*PRIVATE KEY-----)" ~/.dotfiles/ 2>/dev/null
Flag any findings as CRITICAL — credentials in dotfiles can leak via git.
File permission check — these should be 600:
stat -f "%A %N" ~/.dotfiles/.gitconfig-work ~/.dotfiles/.gitconfig-personal 2>/dev/null
Git safety — verify .gitignore in the dotfiles repo includes:
.env, *_token, *_secret, 99-local.zsh, **/*.local.*
Done when credential findings, sensitive-file permissions, and gitignore coverage are recorded as clean or listed as Critical findings with file paths.
Step 1: Shell Startup Time
time zsh -i -c exit
Target: <200ms. >500ms means something is blocking during interactive init.
If slow, isolate which zsh.d file is the culprit:
for f in ~/.zsh.d/*.zsh; do
time zsh -c "source $f" 2>&1 | grep real
echo " ^ $f"
done
Done when one cold interactive startup measurement is recorded, the result is classified OK/SLOW against target, and any SLOW result names a likely zsh.d culprit or next profiling command.
Step 2: Zsh Plugins Audit
Check ~/.dotfiles/zsh/.zshrc and ~/.dotfiles/zsh/zsh.d/ for plugin loading (zinit, antigen, oh-my-zsh, etc.).
Flag heavy plugins:
- Large completion frameworks loaded synchronously
nvm / rbenv / pyenv with eager shell integration (use lazy variants)
- Any plugin that makes network calls or spawns subprocesses at init
Done when each plugin/init integration is classified keep, lazy-load, remove, or needs profiling.
Step 3: Stow Symlink Health
find ~ -maxdepth 3 -type l ! -e 2>/dev/null
A broken symlink means the stow source file was deleted or moved without re-stowing. Fix: either restore the source file or stow -D <package> to remove the dead link.
Done when every broken symlink is listed with its expected source or the report states none found.
Step 4: Neovim Startup Time
nvim --headless --startuptime /tmp/nvim-startup.log +q && sort -k2 -n /tmp/nvim-startup.log | tail -20
Target: <150ms. >300ms needs investigation.
Check which plugins are loading eagerly: the top entries after sorting are the slowest. Cross-reference against the plugin list to find candidates for lazy-loading.
Done when startup time is recorded, classified OK/SLOW, and SLOW results name top slow entries. For targeted repair, stop and route to the neovim skill.
Step 5: Tool Inventory Check
Verify tools referenced in dotfiles are actually installed:
which sesh tmux yabai starship lazygit gh bat fd rg zoxide fzf
Any not found means either:
- The tool was uninstalled but its config is still in dotfiles (orphan config)
- The tool isn't installed yet on this machine (new machine setup)
Done when every referenced tool checked is listed as installed, missing-but-needed, or missing-and-orphaned.
Step 6: Orphan Config Detection
Cross-reference ls ~/.dotfiles/ (stow packages) against the tools found in Step 5. A package with no corresponding installed binary is an orphan.
ls ~/.dotfiles/
Review each package: if the tool it configures isn't installed and you're not planning to use it, consider archiving the package or adding a note.
Done when every package is classified active, setup-required, or orphan candidate.
Completion Gate
Do not produce the final report until each step has either a captured result or an explicit reason it could not run. Security issues rank first regardless of other findings.
Report Format
After running all steps, produce a report:
DOTFILES AUDIT REPORT
=====================
Security
🔴 Critical: [N issues] / ✅ Clean
[List any credential finds with file:line]
[File permission issues]
[Git safety gaps]
Startup Times
Shell: Xms (target <200ms) — [OK | SLOW: investigate zsh.d/X.zsh]
Neovim: Xms (target <150ms) — [OK | SLOW: top culprits: plugin1, plugin2]
Symlink Health
Broken links: X found
[list each broken link and its expected source]
Tool Inventory
Installed: sesh, tmux, starship, ...
Missing: [tool] — config exists at ~/.dotfiles/<package> (orphan or needs install)
Recommended Cleanups (priority order)
1. [most impactful fix — security first, then startup time, then cosmetic]
2. ...
References
| Priority | Load when | Reference |
|---|
| High | Security scan finds issues or credential patterns need review | references/security-patterns.md |
| High | Shell startup is slow and needs profiling strategies | references/shell-performance.md |
| Medium | Auditing a specific package/component after the baseline identifies it | references/component-analysis.md |
| Low | Git config issues found: permissions, signing, aliases, or multi-identity | references/git-config.md |