Engineering Loadout

A self-contained, offline-first toolkit for engineering work environments.

• Old Linux distros
• Limited or no internet access
• No sudo / no root
• Built from 30+ years of engineering workflow experience
• All built on AlmaLinux 8.10 (RHEL 8 clone), glibc 2.28
  • Compatible with RHEL 9.x and beyond

Drop the release tarball onto a locked-down workstation, run one command, and you have modern Linux tooling and sane configurations in your $HOME -- no installer, no admin, no internet.

---

Installation

Linux

Download the .tar.gz release archive from the latest release, then extract and run -- nothing is built or compiled, the archive ships every binary, library, font, and config file ready to install:

tar xzf engineering-loadout-v*.tar.gz
cd engineering-loadout-v*/
./loadout install @engineering-loadout

That installs the @engineering-loadout group -- a curated set of command-line tools, editors, fonts, and configuration files -- into ~/.local and ~/.config. Reload your shell with exec bash when it finishes.

Re-run the same command against a newer release tarball to update. Unchanged files are skipped, so re-runs are quick.

Picking what to install

Name packages or groups the same way dnf or apt works:

./loadout install @engineering-loadout                    # the full set
./loadout install octave                                  # one package
./loadout install @gui-suite                              # a group
./loadout install @engineering-loadout --skip @fonts-all  # everything but fonts
./loadout list                                            # browse packages
./loadout list --tag editor                               # filter by tag
./loadout search vim                                      # substring search
./loadout info gvim                                       # details for one package
./loadout install octave --dry-run                        # preview only

Windows

.\loadout.cmd                  # bootstraps/uses bundled user-local PowerShell
pwsh -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .\loadout.ps1
powershell.exe -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .\loadout-pwsh-bootstrap.ps1  # explicit 5.1 bootstrap

No elevation required.

---

What's Inside

Component	Description
Bash	Layered shell config, 100+ aliases, fzf / zoxide / eza / bat integration
Neovim	LSP, 326 offline Tree-sitter parsers, curated plugin set
Vim	Vim 9.2 with NERDTree, SimpylFold, and vim-liberty bundled
Tmux	Sessions that survive reboot (resurrect + continuum), Ctrl-\ prefix
Helix	Ready to run offline
Starship	Cross-shell prompt, Linux and Windows configs
PowerShell	Aliases, Unix coreutils wrappers, Starship + zoxide integration
WezTerm	Terminal emulator config
AutoHotKey	AHK v2 flat script, feature flags via loadout_keys.toml
EditorConfig	Consistent formatting across all editors
Command-line tools	90+ modern CLI utilities, ready offline -- see table below
Nerd Fonts	12 font families

---

Design Goals

Offline-first. Plugins, parsers, fonts, and binaries are bundled. Nothing is fetched at install time. Ship it to an air-gapped workstation and it just works.

No root. Everything lands in $HOME (or --dest-dir). No package manager, no sudo, no IT ticket.

Shared-tree installs stay relocatable: bundled runtime/data assets live under ~/.local/share (or the staged prefix) and shell init exports the paths needed for discovery, including TERMINFO_DIRS for bundled st terminfo.

Multi-platform. RedHat 7 / 8 / 9, Suse, x86_64 / ARM / PowerPC, and Windows.

Layered configuration. Settings flow from lowest to highest precedence:

Global -> Corp -> Site -> Team -> Project -> User

Each layer overrides the previous without touching the upstream files. Personal tweaks, team conventions, and corporate defaults all coexist without forking anything. Pull a loadout update and your overrides still work.

Opinionated but escapable. Sensible defaults out of the box. Every preference is a LOADOUT_CFG_* variable you can override in your user layer:

# bash/user/config.sh
export LOADOUT_CFG_PREFERRED_VI=vim        # use vim instead of nvim
export LOADOUT_CFG_ENABLE_STARSHIP=0       # use the built-in prompt
export LOADOUT_CFG_ATTACH_TO_TMUX=1        # auto-attach tmux on login
export LOADOUT_CFG_ENABLE_WEZTERM_SHELL_INTEGRATION=0   # disable wezterm OSC integration

---

Smoke Testing

For maximum Linux binary coverage, run the AlmaLinux 8.10 container smoke. It uses a clean base image, copies this checkout inside the container, installs @shared into a temp --dest-dir, and probes every installed executable with only the staged local/bin plus a basic system PATH. The container does not install Python for the harness; it uses ./loadout to bootstrap the bundled Python 3.14 first. The smoke reports deliberate host contracts as skips: cloc needs host Perl, meld needs EL8 /usr/bin/python3.6, and OpenGL GUI apps need host GLVND dispatchers such as libGL.so.1.

pre_built/build_scripts/test-prebuilt-binaries-almalinux8

For the shared-tree deployment model, run the split install smoke. It installs @shared into a temp non-home tree, installs @envs into a separate temp HOME with LOADOUT_CFG_SHARED_PREFIX=<shared>/local, then checks shell startup, shared PATH, terminfo, WezTerm completions, and core tool startup. @envs installs copy config files into ~/.config; old symlinked config subdirectories that point back into the repo are replaced with real directories so installs cannot mutate the checkout.

tests/install_split_shared_envs

---

Bundled Packages

Each row is a package you can install by name with ./loadout install <name>. Groups (@engineering-loadout, @gui-suite, @core-cli, ...) bundle related packages so you can install many at once. Run ./loadout list to see every package and every group, or ./loadout list --groups to see just the groups.

Package	Kind	Version	Description
agent-deck	bin	1.9.12	TUI dashboard for AI agent orchestration
amux	bin	0.0.19	TUI for orchestrating parallel coding agents via git worktrees + tmux
bash	bin	5.3.15	Portable GNU Bash ahead of EL8 system version
bash-docs	runtime	5.3.9	GNU Bash man page (bash.1) and info pages; extracted from bash 5.3 source
bat	bin	0.26.1	cat clone with syntax highlighting and line numbers
biome	bin	2.4.15	Fast Rust JSON/JS/TS/CSS formatter, linter, and LSP (static-pie musl build, no glibc dep)
broot	bin	1.56.2	Interactive tree navigator with fuzzy search
yazi	bin	26.5.6	Blazing-fast terminal file manager (static-pie musl build, no glibc dep); ships the ya CLI companion
btm	bin	0.12.3	Cross-platform system resource monitor (TUI)
btop	bin	1.4.7	Resource monitor with graphs and mouse support
liberty-filter	bin	1.0.1	liberty-filter -- strip unneeded data from Liberty (.lib) timing files; Rust CLI, system-libs only
lefdef-tools	python-tool	b9ac43e	lefdef-tools -- fast LEF/DEF parsing and query tools (Rust backend)
liberty-tools	python-tool	v2026.06.01.1-33-gdc193c1	liberty-tools -- Liberty .lib parser/query library (Rust backend) with liberty_format and liberty_view CLI tools
pdftotext	bin	22.12.0	pdftotext (poppler-utils) -- extract plain text from PDF files; static libpoppler, bundles liblcms2+libopenjp2
p7zip	bin	16.02	p7zip -- Unix port of 7-Zip; 7za standalone binary (LZMA2, zip, gzip, bzip2, tar, cab, etc.)
bzip2	bin	1.0.8	Block-sorting file compressor
choose	bin	1.3.7	awk/cut alternative for column field selection
clang	bin	23.0git	LLVM/Clang 23 compiler toolchain (clang, lld, clangd, clang-format, clang-tidy, llvm-ar/nm/objcopy/objdump/symbolizer/cov/profdata/link)
cloc	bin	2.08	Count Lines of Code by language (blank/comment/code). Self-contained Perl script; requires host perl
scc	bin	3.7.0	Sloc, Cloc and Code -- fast code counter with complexity estimates (GitHub's counter). Go static binary, no deps
tokei	bin	14.0.0	Fast code counter by language. Rust; EL8 source build (v14 ships no prebuilt), links system libs only, glibc 2.28
dasel	bin	3.8.1	Query and modify YAML/JSON/TOML/XML/CSV data
delta	bin	0.19.2	Git diff pager with syntax highlighting
duf	bin	0.9.1	df replacement with colored usage table
dust	bin	1.2.4	du replacement with visual bar chart
flameshot	bin	13.3.0	Flameshot -- powerful GUI screenshot tool. flameshot 13.3.0 back-ported to Qt5 for EL8 (upstream is Qt6-only); needs gui_libs (Qt5/X11) + DISPLAY
expect	bin	5.45.4	Tcl-based tool for automating interactive CLI programs
eza	bin	0.23.4	ls replacement with icons, colors, git status
fd	bin	10.4.2	Fast and user-friendly find alternative
fio	bin	3.42	Flexible I/O tester -- storage and filesystem performance benchmark
fzf	bin	0.72.0	General-purpose command-line fuzzy finder
gnuplot	bin	6.0.2	Command-line graphing and plotting utility
glow	bin	2.1.2	Terminal markdown renderer/pager with styles
gocheat	bin	0.1.1	Interactive terminal cheatsheet browser (EL8 source build, CGO_ENABLED=0 static)
keyb	bin	0.8.0	Customizable TUI cheatsheet for keybindings/aliases; fuzzy filter, fzf/rofi export
gping	bin	1.20.1	Ping with live graph visualization
htop	bin	3.2.1	Interactive process viewer and manager
hx	bin	25.07.1	Modern modal text editor with tree-sitter and LSP
hyperfine	bin	1.20.0	Command-line benchmarking tool
ncdu	bin	2.9.2	NCurses disk usage -- interactive disk space analyzer (Zig v2)
jq	bin	1.8.1	Lightweight JSON processor and formatter
just	bin	1.50.0	Command runner, ergonomic Makefile alternative
lazygit	bin	0.61.1	TUI git client for staging, committing, rebasing
llvm-bolt	bin	23.0git	LLVM BOLT binary optimizer + perf2bolt profile converter + merge-fdata
micro	bin	2.0.15	Beginner-friendly terminal text editor
miller	bin	6.18.1	CSV/TSV/JSON/NDJSON data processor (mlr)
ninja	bin	1.13.2	Fast build system used by CMake and LLVM
numr	bin	0.5.5	Text calculator for natural-language expressions with a vim-style TUI (units, currency, variables)
fresh	bin	0.3.8	Fresh text editor (Rust, tree-sitter, TypeScript/JavaScript config)
nvim	bin	0.12.2	Hyperextensible Vim-based text editor
patchelf	bin	0.12	Modify ELF RPATH and interpreter in-place
pigz	bin	2.8	Parallel implementation of gzip
procs	bin	0.14.11	ps replacement with colors and process tree
pv	bin	1.6.6	Monitor and show progress of data through a pipe
rg	bin	15.1.0	Extremely fast grep alternative (ripgrep)
rsync	bin	3.4.1	Efficient file sync with delta-transfer algorithm
ruff	bin	0.15.17	Extremely fast Python linter and formatter
sd	bin	1.0.0	sed alternative with simpler regex syntax
shfmt	bin	3.13.1	Shell script formatter and parser
shellcheck	bin	0.11.0	Static analysis linter for shell scripts
starship	bin	1.25.1	Cross-shell customizable minimal prompt
stylua	bin	2.4.1	Opinionated Lua code formatter
tkdiff	bin	6.0	Tcl/Tk visual diff and merge tool
tldr	bin	1.8.1	Simplified community man pages (tealdeer)
tmux	bin	3.6b	Terminal multiplexer with session management
tree-sitter	bin	0.26.8	Incremental parser generator and query tool
ty	bin	0.0.49	Fast Python type checker (Astral)
gnu-coreutils	bin	9.7	GNU coreutils -- individual binaries (ls, cp, mv, etc.) built from source on EL8
uv	bin	0.11.21	Extremely fast Python package and project manager
vim	bin	9.2.0458	Vi IMproved text editor
gvim	bin	9.2.0458	GTK3 GUI Vim with clipboard and font rendering
nedit-ng	bin	2025.1	Qt5 GUI text editor, NEdit rewrite
nvim-qt	bin	0.2.19	Official Qt5 GUI frontend for Neovim (menus, tabs, mouse, floating windows; no GPU required)
mesa3d_libs	runtime	23.1.4	Mesa 3D userspace runtime -- Mesa EGL vendor library, GBM, libglapi, DRI drivers, and LLVM runtime (no GLVND dispatcher libs)
gui_libs	lib-bundle		Qt5/GTK3/X11/Wayland shared library bundle (for headless compute farm GUI forwarding)
xsel	bin	1.2.0	X11 clipboard command-line access tool
yara	bin	4.5.5	Malware pattern matching and classification tool
xterm	bin	410	X11 terminal emulator with Unicode and color
urxvt	bin	9.31	rxvt-unicode -- X11 terminal with Unicode, Xft, and daemon mode (perl extensions disabled)
wezterm	bin	20260618_095146_c10636f3	WezTerm terminal emulator -- shanghai bundle from system install; sample app for bundled Mesa 3D runtime
st	bin	0.9.3	suckless st -- minimal X11 terminal with undercurl patch (UNDERCURL_CURLY)
yank	bin	1.3.0	Select terminal output and copy to clipboard
yq	bin	4.53.2	YAML/JSON/XML/CSV processor (jq for YAML)
zellij	bin	0.44.3	Terminal workspace multiplexer (no-web build; WASM plugins disabled)
zoxide	bin	0.9.9	Smarter cd with frecency ranking (z/zi)
octave	bin	11.1.0	GNU scientific computing language (MATLAB-compatible)
ngspice	bin	46	ngspice -- open-source mixed-level SPICE circuit simulator (XSPICE + CIDER enabled, no-X11 headless build)
visidata	python-tool	3.3	TUI spreadsheet for CSV/TSV/JSON data
meld	bin	3.20.4	GTK3 visual diff and merge tool (shanghai bundle -- system py3.6 + bundled PyGObject/GtkSource)
mate-terminal	bin	1.26.1	MATE Terminal -- GTK3 tabbed VTE terminal (shanghai bundle from EL8 EPEL; GSettings keyfile backend, no dconf-service needed)
firefox	bin	140.11.0	Mozilla Firefox ESR (shanghai bundle from EL8 BaseOS; thin POSIX-sh launcher exec's bundled firefox-bin)
zsh	bin	5.9	Z shell -- powerful interactive shell with advanced tab completion; modules static, function library shipped via runtime archive
fish	bin	4.7.1	Fish shell -- friendly interactive shell with autosuggestions and syntax highlighting
tcl	bin	9.0.3	Tcl scripting language -- tclsh interpreter and runtime library
tk	bin	9.0.3	Tk GUI toolkit -- wish interpreter and embedded Tk runtime
nodejs	bin	26.2.0	Node.js LTS JavaScript runtime with npm/npx/corepack (for LSP servers, JS tooling)
jupyterlab	python-tool	4.5.7	Web-based interactive development environment for notebooks, code, and data
time-plot	python-tool	2a1c077	Plot arbitrary data vs. zero-based time with plugins for custom data file parsers
text-serdes	python-tool	c9e83b7	text-serdes -- short-lived encrypted text transport for copy/paste workflows (enc/dec)
pygwalker	python-tool	0.5.0.1	Turn pandas DataFrames into an interactive Tableau-style data explorer (Jupyter or pygwalker serve)
portable-python	python-base	3.14.4	BOLT-optimized portable CPython build with bundled install.sh
gobject-typelibs	typelib		GObject introspection typelibs (GLib/Gtk3/GtkSource3/Pango/Atk/cairo)
tldr-data	data		Bundled tldr-pages cache for offline tealdeer use
treesitter-parsers	data		Pre-built tree-sitter parsers (.so), queries, parser-info, registry, and build-info for 300+ languages
nvim-catalog-plugins	data		50-plugin curated nvim catalog (disabled by default; enable per-plugin in user layer)
modules	runtime	5.6.1	Environment Modules -- module load/unload for shell environment management (HPC-style)
rust-analyzer	bin	410	Rust language server (LSP) -- diagnostics, go-to-def, completions
rust	runtime	1.96.0	Rust toolchain (rustc + cargo + std) for offline cargo build; repacked from rustup stable, relocatable
rust-crate-store	data		Offline Cargo local-registry (top crates + every loadout rust tool's dependency closure); enables cargo build --offline
gopls	bin	0.22.0	Go language server (LSP) -- diagnostics, go-to-def, completions
lua-language-server	bin	3.18.2	Lua language server (LSP) -- useful for nvim config and Lua tooling
pyright	python-tool	1.1.410	Python language server (LSP) -- type-checking, go-to-def, completions
tmux-path-store	python-tool	1.0.0	Tmux window-name-keyed directory/file path store -- shell aliases for per-window path bookmarks

If your machine doesn't already have GTK3 / Qt5 / X11 / Wayland libraries installed (common on remote compute nodes), install gui_libs alongside any GUI application:

./loadout install gvim nedit-ng gui_libs
# Or use the group, which pulls gui_libs for you:
./loadout install @gui-suite

GPU-accelerated apps such as WezTerm also pull mesa3d_libs, which installs Mesa's EGL vendor library, GBM, DRI drivers, and LLVM runtime without bundling host display-driver dispatchers like libGL.so.1. The WezTerm bundle keeps wezterm, wezterm-gui, and wezterm-mux-server as sibling real binaries under ~/.local/lib/wezterm/, with PATH wrappers in ~/.local/bin. Its zsh completion is installed by env-zsh; bash completion can be generated with wezterm shell-completion --shell bash. WezTerm shell integration (semantic zones / OSC 7 cwd / user vars -- distinct from completion) is vendored at bash/global/wezterm/wezterm.sh and sourced by the bash config from user-writable space (never /etc), so wezterm users get it with or without tmux; toggle with LOADOUT_CFG_ENABLE_WEZTERM_SHELL_INTEGRATION.

Python

Python 3.14.4 -- a portable Python build that installs to ~/.local. Use python3.14 and pip3.14 to pin this build.

---

Neovim -- 326 Offline Tree-sitter Parsers

The full nvim-treesitter parser registry is bundled and installs offline to ~/.local/share/nvim/tree-sitter-parsers/. All 326 languages work out of the box, no internet required.

---

Nerd Fonts

Twelve font families bundled and installed to ~/.local/share/fonts:

Font	Notes
Cascadia Code	Microsoft coding font
DejaVu Sans Mono	Broad Unicode coverage
Envy Code R	Clean, distinctive coding font
Fira Code	Ligature-rich monospace
Hack	Designed for source code
Inconsolata	Humanist monospace
Iosevka Term	Ultra-narrow, highly legible
JetBrains Mono	Designed for long coding sessions
Meslo LG	Powerlevel10k default family
Roboto Mono	Google monospace family
Source Code Pro	Adobe's open-source workhorse
Ubuntu Mono	Ubuntu monospace family

Use ./loadout install ... --skip @fonts-all to skip every font, or --skip font-firacode to skip a single family.

---

Bash Configuration

Six-layer override chain (global -> corp -> site -> team -> project -> user), LOADOUT_CFG_* knobs, and a curated alias set:

• b / bb / bbb ... -- cd .. up 1, 2, 3 levels
• cdd / cddd ... -- cd to the N-th most recently modified directory
• g -- ripgrep with sensible defaults (smart case, hidden, no-ignore)
• f -- fd with sensible defaults, falls back to find
• gs / gc / gp / gd / ga -- git status / commit / push / diff / add
• vi / vim -- your preferred editor (nvim by default)
• cat -- bat with no paging
• ll / la / lh -- ls variants (sizes, all files, human-readable)

---

Tmux

Prefix Ctrl-\. Shift-arrows for pane navigation, Ctrl-arrows for windows, Prefix+1-5 for layout presets, Prefix+v to capture the pane buffer into nvim. tmux-resurrect and tmux-continuum bundled -- your sessions come back after a reboot.