After a few… let’s say enthusiastic iterations of installing Arch Linux (we don’t count installs, we count character development), I finally started piecing together something resembling a usable system. This wasn’t just an OS install this was a rite of passage. The kind of journey where you emerge from your tiling window manager blinking into the light of a fully functional system, dotfiles in one hand, terminal in the other. The catalyst for this chaos? None other than Mischa yes, that Mischa. You know the one: the guru of minimalism, the k8s whisperer, the Zettelkasten diplomat. After watching some of his workflows and config walkthroughs I thought, “How hard could it be?” Narrator: It was very hard. Once the dust settled from another glorious pacstrap and I stopped yelling at grub, (Mischa recommends systemd-boot and rightfully so, I changed to it on my next iteration. Anyhow, I was left with a mess of personalized configs (not to mention Hyprland configs) scattered all over ~/.config, .bashrc, .zshrc, .nvim, and half a dozen symlink experiments gone rogue. And that’s when I met her…stow. A tool so simple, yet so elegant, I wanted to slap my past self for not using it sooner. What the heck is stow? GNU Stow is a symlink farm manager. It’s designed to help you manage your dotfiles by creating symlinks from a central repo to your home directory (or wherever you need them). No more script spaghetti or juggling lns like a clown at a shell prompt. How it works (in plain English) Imagine this: You’ve got a repo of dotfiles: dotfiles/ ├── bash/ │ └── .bashrc ├── nvim/ │ └── .config/nvim/init.lua ├── zsh/ │ └── .zshrc stow bash zsh nvim And like magic, stow symlinks everything right into place. Boom. Configs deployed. No fuss. No mess. Just pure, delicious symlink wizardry. Why it changed my life (ok maybe just my install sanity) 🚀 Easy to update configs: Edit your dotfiles repo, run stow again. Done. 🔁 Reproducible setups: Setting up a new machine becomes a one-liner.

This post is for everyone who's still on levels 1 to 3. Go on, say hello :-) Anyone who's level 4 or higher is only allowed to use the reply function. Let's see if this works here -Mischa

I'm currently researching how to setup a homelab and potential hardware purchases. One thing that I'm wondering is how kubernetes nodes are run in the real world, on physical hardware or virtual machines? I'm trying to figure out if I should first learn to use proxmox to create VMs / LXC containers and then use those containers to install Kubernetes nodes and will this be applicable in the real world.

I’m pleased to share that I’ve successfully completed the Kubernetes Fundamentals course — and what a journey it has been! I’d like to echo the sentiments of @Mischa van den Burg : this course is an excellent starting point for anyone beginning their Kubernetes journey. I can personally attest to its value. Before joining Kubecraft, I had attempted several Kubernetes tutorials on YouTube. Unfortunately, they often focused heavily on theory and static manifest screenshots, with minimal hands-on engagement. What sets @Mischa van den Burg apart is his clear and thoughtful teaching style. He takes the time to explain concepts in depth not just Kubernetes, but also practical tools like Vim, ensuring you're efficient and effective as you build. The course focuses on what truly matters for beginners: Pods, Deployments, Networking, and Storage — the core fundamentals needed to deploy real applications on Kubernetes. Not only did I complete all the exercises in the course, but I also immediately began migrating some of my Docker applications to Kubernetes. The transition felt natural, thanks to the solid foundation laid by this course. Since completing the training, I’ve found it significantly easier to work through other supplementary materials. I now have a fully functional lab environment and a much clearer understanding of Kubernetes as a platform. If you're still undecided about diving into Kubernetes, I highly recommend giving this course a try. It's structured, practical, and incredibly empowering.