Followed http://gmarik.info/blog/2010/05/02/tracking-dotfiles-with-git
to store my dotfiles in git.

How to install dotfiles (may overwrite your existing files so be
careful!)

git clone --bare git@github.com:jbrownbridge/dotfiles.git ~/dotfiles.git
#setup bash alias
alias .G="git --git-dir=$HOME/dotfiles.git --work-tree=$HOME/"
  
# commit original files in orig branch for backup
# WARNING: backup what's going to be overwritten
.G status -s -uno   # review changelist
.G checkout -b original_files 
.G commit -a  -m 'original files'
.G checkout master 


To get meld to work with git you need to add the following to your .gitconfig
file:

[diff]
	external = ~/bin/diff.py

To get vim to work correctly you will probably need to create a .backup
directory in you home directory:
  mkdir -p ~/.backup

To get flymake to work correctly you will need to add the following to your
project Makefile (make sure tabs/spacing is correct):

.PHONY: check-syntax
check-syntax:
  $(CXX) $(INCLUDES) -Wall -fsyntax-only $(CHK_SOURCES)

I have only tested flymake with c++ so ymmv. CHK_SOURCES is populated by
the following file (set to current file being edited in vim %s directive):
  .vim/after/ftplugin/c/flymake.vim

Flymake will only execute on write and may cause your editor to lock for
several seconds depending on how long make takes.