i know the way android stores application config and so on makes it almost imposible to keep a real functioning dotfiles. but what is the closest you can get? is there a way to at least get a declarative list of apps to install or something? maybe some f-droid config at least or something?
Installed apps is hard cause they could be from the Play store or from F-Droid or Obtanium or raw APK installs.
Of those, Obtanium let’s you export things and import. Some F-Droid clients will do that too, but the stock one will only export – I don’t see a mechanism for import. Play store is usually automatic with their migration feature.
So it sounds less like you want “dotfiles” and more you want a declarative Nix config for Android. Wildly different meanings. And neither really something Android does at all and isn’t built around. It’d be like trying to turn an average Ubuntu install with some third-party DEBs sans sources into Nix, except half your apps store their info in Root somehow and you don’t have root access.
This is why stuff like Titanium Backup exists. Fundamentally, this is an X-Y problem presented – the assumption your stated method (Nixification and system settings) is the means to achieving an ends (backup you can transfer around, or to wipe of the same device).
Unless Nixification itself is the sole goal for the sake of “project”, in which case, why be asking instead of making? X3 You might find something more like that in a Linux distro for a phone like Nura/postmarket or building one. But Android’s architecture is too weird for cleanly doing that.