DEV Community: Jeremy

Setting Up Dual Boot with Windows and Arch Linux Using systemd-boot

Jeremy — Mon, 28 Apr 2025 04:48:35 +0000

Dual-booting Windows and Arch Linux is fairly straightforward when each operating system is installed separately. However, you might need to manually select the boot device through your BIOS settings every time you want to switch. To make this more convenient, you can configure systemd-boot to present a centralized boot menu, allowing you to choose between Arch and Windows easily at startup.

Installing and Configuring `systemd-boot`

systemd-boot comes bundled with systemd, so you don't need to install anything extra. To initialize it, simply use bootctl:

bootctl install

This command will install systemd-boot into your EFI system partition, set up a new bootloader entry named Linux Boot Manager, and configure it as the first option in your UEFI firmware.

At this point, if you reboot, you will only see Arch Linux listed as a boot option — we still need to add Windows manually.

Adding the Windows Boot Entry

The goal is to make Windows available directly from the systemd-boot menu. To do this, we'll copy Windows' EFI boot files into Linux's EFI partition. systemd-boot will automatically detect the Windows bootloader once the files are in place — no need to create a manual entry.

Step 1: Identify the Windows EFI Partition

First, list all block devices:

lsblk

Sample output:

NAME          MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINTS  
sda             8:0    0 223.6G  0 disk   
├─sda1          8:1    0   100M  0 part   
├─sda2          8:2    0    16M  0 part   
├─sda3          8:3    0 222.9G  0 part   
└─sda4          8:4    0   546M  0 part   
zram0         253:0    0     4G  0 disk [SWAP]  
nvme0n1       259:0    0 476.9G  0 disk   
├─nvme0n1p1   259:1    0     1G  0 part /boot  
├─nvme0n1p2   259:2    0    47G  0 part /  
└─nvme0n1p3   259:3    0 428.9G  0 part /home

In this example, sda1 is a 100MB partition, which typically indicates Windows' EFI partition.

Step 2: Mount the Windows EFI Partition

Create a mount point and mount the Windows EFI partition:

sudo mkdir /mnt/windows-efi
sudo mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/windows-efi

Step 3: Copy Windows Boot Files

Copy the Microsoft EFI directory into your Arch system’s EFI folder:

sudo cp -r /mnt/windows-efi/EFI/Microsoft /boot/EFI/

Once copied, systemd-boot will automatically detect the Windows Boot Manager.

Final Step: Reboot and Enjoy

After setting everything up, reboot your machine. You should now see both Arch Linux and Windows listed in the systemd-boot menu — no additional configuration required!

How to configure neovim's Lua LS for Love2D

Jeremy — Tue, 24 Dec 2024 22:56:00 +0000

I've been trying out Love2D by recreating old retro games, I like how simple Love is, and I get to use neovim as my editor of choice. While browsing the Lua LS documentation, I noticed this on the "Add-ons" page.

Addons can be used to add additional content for the Lua Language Server by doing the following:

Providing definitions for a framework/library/API.

This had bothered me for a while, since using Love's API does not provide any sort of competition.

First, pick a directory to store all your add-ons. Mine will be ~/.local/share/LuaAddons.

mkdir ~/.local/share/LuaAddons
cd ~/.local/share/LuaAddons

Here we will grab a copy of the Love2D add-on.

git clone https://github.com/LuaCATS/love2d.git

Open your neovim configuration and edit Lua LS's set-up snippet.

lspconfig.lua_ls.setup {
    settings = {
        Lua = {
            workspace = {
                -- Path to your Addons directory
                userThirdParty = {os.getenv("HOME") .. ".local/share/LuaAddons"},
                checkThirdParty = "Apply"
            }
        }
    }
}

This should be everything you need to get a nice competition menu when using love.

2026 Update: I have now switched to LazyVim, here is an updated snippet to extend your server settings.

--- lua/plugins/love.lua
return {
  "neovim/nvim-lspconfig",
  opts = {
    servers = {
      lua_ls = {
        settings = {
          Lua = {
            workspace = {
              library = { os.getenv("HOME") .. "/.local/share/LuaAddons" },
              checkThirdParty = false,
            },
          },
        },
      },
    },
  },
}

You can check the official documentation for reference.

Setting up neovim for Laravel development

Jeremy — Sun, 22 Dec 2024 19:10:02 +0000

When I decided to learn Laravel, I assumed configuring Neovim would be as straightforward as setting it up for any other language. However, I quickly discovered a few extra steps were necessary to achieve a smooth development experience with Laravel.

Two PHP LSPs? Which One to Choose?

The Neovim LSP Config documentation lists two available LSP servers for PHP: PHP Actor and Intelephense.

Intelephense is a "freemium" LSP. While it provides basic functionality for free, features like variable renaming and code actions require a $25 USD lifetime license.
PHP Actor is a free alternative that includes the core features you'd expect from an LSP.

In my experience, Intelephense produced fewer diagnostic errors, likely due to Laravel's "magic". That said, PHP Actor is a solid option, and I recommend trying both to see which works best for you. Maybe try PHP Actor while you are learning Laravel to see if you would like to invest on Intelephense.

Laravel IDE Helper

Laravel can confuse LSPs, which is where Laravel IDE Helper package comes in. It is a CLI that generates helper files that improve auto-completion and solves diagnostic errors.

First, install it as a development dependency in your project.

composer require --dev barryvdh/laravel-ide-helper

And generate helper files (you are supposed to add these to your .gitignore).

php artisan ide-helper:generate

There are many more features offered by this CLI (please check the documentation), if you enjoy using wrappers around these sort of CLI's within neovim you could checkout Laravel IDE Helper NVIM.

Blade Syntax Highlighting with Tree-Sitter

You can install php_only if you are only interested on using Laravel as your API backend. If you would are interested on front-end development with blade components, you should install the php and tree-sitter-blade grammars.

To set tree-sitter-blade up, copy the following code snippet into your neovim configuration.

local treesiter = require("nvim-treesitter.configs")
local parser_config = require "nvim-treesitter.parsers".get_parser_configs()
parser_config.blade = {
    install_info = {
        url = "https://github.com/EmranMR/tree-sitter-blade",
        files = { "src/parser.c" },
        branch = "main",
    },
    filetype = "blade"
}

vim.filetype.add({
    pattern = {
        ['.*%.blade%.php'] = 'blade',
    }
})
local bladeGrp
vim.api.nvim_create_augroup("BladeFiltypeRelated", { clear = true })
vim.api.nvim_create_autocmd({ "BufNewFile", "BufRead" }, {
    pattern = "*.blade.php",
    group = bladeGrp,
    callback = function()
        vim.opt.filetype = "blade"
    end,
})

Create the following file structure in your neovim configuration directory.

after
└── queries
    └── blade
        ├── highlights.scm
        └── injections.scm

3 directories, 2 files

Paste the following content in highlights.scm.

# File: highlights.scm
(directive) @function
(directive_start) @function
(directive_end) @function
(comment) @comment
((parameter) @include (#set! "priority" 110))
((php_only) @include (#set! "priority" 110))
((bracket_start) @function (#set! "priority" 120))
((bracket_end) @function (#set! "priority" 120))
(keyword) @function

Paste the following content in injections.scm.

# File: injections.scm
((text) @injection.content
    (#not-has-ancestor? @injection.content "envoy")
    (#set! injection.combined)
    (#set! injection.language php))

Note: Here is a git commit if you would like to verify my changes.

After this is done, you should be able install the blade grammar with TSInstall blade. I do recommend you also install the html, css and javascript grammars for the next step.

Adding HTML LSP Support for Blade Templates

This should provide a good enough experience, in my case I also want to write CSS and Javascript inside my blade components. This can be done with the HTML LSP, we simply enable it on blade files.

To do so, you simply add the blade file type to the configuration.

-- $ npm install -g vscode-langservers-extracted
local capabilities = vim.lsp.protocol.make_client_capabilities()
capabilities.textDocument.completion.completionItem.snippetSupport = true
lspconfig.html.setup {
    capabilities = capabilities,
    filetypes = { "html", "blade" },
    init_options = {
        configurationSection = { "html", "css", "javascript" },
        embeddedLanguages = {
            css = true,
            javascript = true
        },
        provideFormatter = true
    }
}

Code Formatting

I use Conform.nvim for formatting code. Here, I picked Pint since it was developed by the Laravel team.

require("conform").setup({
    formatters_by_ft = {
        -- Laravel's Formatter
        -- See: https://github.com/laravel/pint
        php = { "pint" },
    }
})

For blade files it is possible to use prettier, but if you are already set-up with HTML LSP, then it will provide formatting out of the box.

More Plugins

I also decided to ask around on Reddit to see if I was missing an essential plugin. You may take a look at the thread filled with recommendations here.

Recommended plugins for Laravel?

It also looks like an official VS Code plugin is being developed by the Laravel team, I have seen rummors about an LSP being considered. So there is hope that the development experience may improve for Neovim users.

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