Skip to content

vim neovim Notes

Jump to bottom
Chris Jones edited this page Oct 25, 2018 · 57 revisions

Contents

General 🔝

has() checks for features

To get a list of features supported by Vim or Neovim

:h feature-list

That said, mkview is a command, and not a feature.

To check if Vim or Neovim suports a command in a Vimscript file, ie. .vim

exists(':mr42fancy') == 2

2 will do an exact literal string match for mr42fancy.

To print a statement to messages

echom 'mr fancy message'

To clear messages in Vim / Neovim

The below command requires Vim 7.4.1735

:messages clear

To set the syntax highlighting for a specific file, using a specific formatting

:set syntax=[LANGUAGE]

Ex

To set the stynax for a .babelrc file

:set syntax=json

To write to or save a file opened in Vim or Neovim without having proper permissions, ie. super user perms

:w !sudo tee > /dev/null %

For a deeper understanding of what the above command is doing see

To adjust the indentation of a particular line within a file

>>

To auto indent a line in vim

==

To paste code from the clipboard with indentation

:set paste

Installing Vim using Linuxbrew clipboard support 🔝

To get clipboard support working with Vim when installing Vim 8.x on Debian, make sure the following dependencies have been installed.

  1. libx11-dev
  2. libxtst-dev
apt-get install libx11-dev libxtst-dev

If Vim has already been installed via brew it can be reinstalled,

brew -v reinstall --build-from-source --with-client-server vim

To test if xclip is working within a remote ssh session

echo "copy me" | xclip -selection clipboard

To print all variables and variable values ie. python_host_prog assigned within Vim or Neovim

:let

To copy all lines of an open buffer to the system clipboard

:%y+

To display a list of commands in Vim or Neovim

:Commands

To display the decimal, octal, and hex representation of a character in Vim

g + a

To repeat the previous command or last operation

.

To show the current running version of Vim or Neovim

:version

To reload the current buffer

:edit

or

:source %

To start Vim or Neovim without loading a .vimrc configuration file

vim -u NONE

File Structure General 🔝

To override default settings for specific filetypes use the after directory located within $HOME/.vim, ie. for specific settings related to python

$HOME/.vim/after/ftplugin/python.vim

Vim and Neovim allow creating a new file / buffer within a directory that does not yet exist, so it can become problematic to save the newly created file / buffer to disk if the containing directory doesn't exist on the file system.

To work around the above mentioned scenario use the key binding within mappings.vim file present within this dotfiles repo.

leader mkd

or run the below command from within Vim

!mkdir -p %:p:h

To get a high level overview of settings in Vim & Neovim

:browse options

To print out all the options / settings enbabled for the active buffer

:browse set

To check and see if python 3 support is working with Neovim

:echo has('python3')

To check to see if Vim or Neovim was compiled with a specific setting

:echo has('[mr-fancy-setting]')

ie.

:echo has('clipboard')

To check and see which particular clipboard is being used, ie. unnamed or unnamedplus

:set clipboard?

For more information see:

:h version
:h has(
:h feature-list

To toggle VISUAL mode

v

To toggle invisible characters

:set list!

To exit PASTE mode

:set nopaste

To change the mode to visual-block or v-block

control+v

To switch between an open and closing parentheses ( or curly brace { press % in NORMAL mode.

To inspect the runtimepath

:set rtp?

To print a list of all scripts in the order in which they were loading at runtime

:scriptnames

To print the current working directory

:pwd

To change the local working directory

:lcd

To print the $VIMRUNTIME path

echo $VIMRUNTIME

To redraw the UI elements, ie. User Interface

control + l

To print / return the value of a setting

:set option?

ie.

:set autoindent?

To see where a particular setting is being set ie. which file and line is issuing the setting.

:verbose set option?

ie.

:verbose set termguicolors?

To display the current key mappings for normal, visual, insert

:nmap
:vmap
:imap

To display all key mappings within a Neovim session

:map

To display a value of an environment variable within a Neovim session

:echo [$MR_FANCY_ENV_VAR_01, $MR_FANCY_ENV_VAR_02]

ie. to display the values of the below environment variables within Neovim

:echo [$LANG, $LC_CTYPE, $LC_ALL]

Working with buffers 🔝

To reload all buffers, ie. will update code folds when new ones are added

:bufdo e

To display a list of open buffers

:ls

To switch to the previous buffer

:bp

To switch to the new buffer

:bN

Working with autocommands, ie. autocmd 🔝

Protip when working with autocommands, and expiermenting with new features in .vimrc or init.vim make certain to enclose autocmd! within an augroup block or the autocmd! will be reloaded, and NOT flush out the previously defined autocmd!, thus slowing Vim & Neovim exponentially with each reload of a configuration file.

A proper way to define autocommands within a .vimrc

augroup customColorscheme
  " Clear the group
  autocmd!
  autocmd ColorScheme * call CustomHighlights()
augroup END

Searching For Patterns the_platinum_searcher 🔝

To search for a pattern within all text or source code files within the current working directory

pt [mr-fancy-expression-to-search-for]

The above command is quite useful for finding syntax errors that are scattered through a directory structure, and the specific file / line is not specified within standard error output.

Working with Cursor color and shape 🔝

Working with Splits 🔝

Vim can create horizontal & vertical splits within a Vim session, ie. think how panes split the current window in tmux.

To create a vertical split within Vim

:vsplit

To create a horizontal split using a Vim command

:split

The above split commands will create a split, ie. a new buffer with the file from the previous buffer in the new split.

To create a horizontal split without the previous open buffers from the prior window

:sp 0

The above command will create a horizontal split with a buffer named 0 however the previously open buffer in the previos window will not be shown in the new split.

A split can also be created by specifying a path to a different file.

Ex

:sp ./path/to/README.md

With my current Vim configuration a horizontal split be created below the current buffer with the README.md file contained within the split.

To create a vertical split using key bindings

control + W then v

To create a horizontal split using key bindings

control + W then S

Yes, that is a capital S and not a lower case s

To close all splits other than the active split / window

:on

:on is short for :only

Buffers can be accessed across multiple splits. 🤘

To learn more about using splits within Vim

:h opening-window

Working with Italic fonts 🔝

  • First, make sure the terminal can support italics 
echo -e "\e[3m foo \e[23m"

To get italic code comments working with Neovim the below line is required 🎖

highlight Comment gui=italic

Working with Sessions and Views 🔝

TL;DR

  • session files can store the state of all open buffers and much more.
  • views can store the state of code folds and cursor position within a buffer.
:h sessionoptions
:h viewoptions

Working with Sessions and Views Manually Invoking 🔝

To manually create a session file for the current Vim session

:mks ~/.vim/tmp/sessions/[mr-fancy-session.vim]

To manually create a view file that preserves code fold for the current session

:mkview ~/.vim/tmp/views/[mr-fancy-view.vim]

If an existing session.vim or view.vim file exists use the ! option to replace the existing file

ie.

To update a session file

:mks! ~/.vim/tmp/sessions/[mr-fancy-session.vim]

Python Support 🔝

Python Support anaconda 🔝

To uninstall anaconda on macOS follow the instructions provided by the below link. Official anaconda uninstall

Python Support Setting Up Python 2/3 🔝

🚨 Make certain that a Homebrew or Linuxbrew python is not in the $PATH when trying to install a particular version of Python using pyenv, especially on a Linux box.

To setup different versions of Python for a particular user, use pyenv

pyenv can be installed via homebrew or cloning the github repo pyenv/pyenv I chose the latter because I was running into issues using the homebrew version of pyenv.

To install pyenv on macOS

git clone https://github.com/pyenv/pyenv $code/python/pyenv

To update the list of available pythons to install

cd $PYENV_ROOT; git pull

To get virtualenv support with python install pyenv-virtualenv

git clone https://github.com/pyenv/pyenv-virtualenv $PYENV_ROOT/plugins/pyenv-virtualenv

Once those two packages have been installed, one can begin installing different versions of python.

On Debian some additional packages will need to be installed in order for python 2.7.X to be installed, ie. libbz2-dev

To get verbose output when building python using pyenv

pyenv install -v 2.7.14

To setup a virtualenv named neovim2 for the python-neovim provider packages

pyenv virtualenv 2.7.14 neovim2

To activate the neovim2 virtual environment

pyenv activate neovim2

To install the neovim python module for Neovim within the neovim2 virtualenv

pip install neovim

The above command pip install neovim works for both neovim2 and neovim3 virtual environments.

To print the path for the python executable for the neovim2 env

pyenv which python

🚨 when providing the path for the python executable in init.vim MAKE CERTAIN to use the full path, ie. DO NOT use the $HOME env var or else :checkhealth will fail.

Add the above python path to init.vim

To activate the neovim2 virtualenv

pyenv activate neovim2

To exit out of either virtualenv

pyenv deactivate

To remove a virtualenv created with pyenv and pyenv-virtualenv

pyenv uninstall [name-of-virtualenv]

To check and see if vim is compiled with either python2 or python3 support

:version

To get detailed help information about the python providers for Neovim

:help provider-python

Vim only supports python 2 or python 3, but not both at the same time.

Neovim can support both Python 2 and Python 3 at the same time.

To check and see if Neovim supports Python 3

:py3 print('hello')

Useful Links Python Support 🔝

Working with Tabs 🔝

Each vim tab contains it's own unique splits. Think of a tab in Vim as a window in tmux.

To create a new tab within a Vim session

:tabnew

To focus on the next tab

g+t

To focus on the previous tab

g+T

To move to the next tab

g+t

To move to the previous tab

g+T

Working with wildmenu 🔝

When the wildmenu is present for navigating between files and one wants to cd into a directory use the ↓ down arrow on the keypad to go into the selected directory.

Working with netrw ie. file explorer 🔝

To toggle a vertical file explorer, ie. netrw to left of the current buffer

:Vex

To create a new file within the current working directory followed by a filename

:% [FILENAME]

To create a new directory using netrw d

To rename the current highlighted directory using netrw R

To close a netrw buffer,

  1. find the buffer number with :ls
  2. close the buffer with :bd[#], ie. :bd42

Spell Checking 🔝

To enable spell checking in vim

set spell

A dictionary file may need to be downloaded before spell checking can be enabled.

To add a "misspelled" word to a local dictionary file

z then g

To remove a "misspelled" word from a local dictionary file

z then w

To correct a misspelled word

z + =

The above commands must be run from command or normal mode

Visual Block Mode 🔝

To insert into visual block mode

ctrl+v

Then select which lines you would like the repeated text to appear on.

Then go into visual insert mode with shift+i

Then type out what you want repeated and it will appear in the buffer after exiting insert mode.

When working in visual block mode to toggle between opposing corners when drawing a rectangular region.

o

Working with Documentation in Vim 🔝

To launch the help system within nvim

:help

To generate documentation for installed plugins

:helptags ALL

Neovim Profiling 🔝

To record verbose startup time of Vim or Neovim into a file

nvim --startuptime /tmp/nvim.log

Vim & Neovim Plugins 🔝

To print all loaded vim scripts on a separate line

:scriptnames

Vim & Neovim Plugin Definitions 🔝

  • minpac is a lightweight plugin manager written around the new packages and jobs features introduced in Vim 8.x and Neovim 0.2.x
  • vim-projectionist a handy plugin for opening a source file's counterpart.
  • vim-multiple-cursors name says it all.
  • limelight.vim grey out code blocks that don't have focus
  • ALE a useful plugin for linting various source code files
  • Deoplete inline completion for Neovim.
  • vim-markdown-composer preview the current .md document in the default browser.

Working with minpac 🔝

minpac builds on top Vim's job-control features introduced in Vim 8.

To print or view a log of messages from running PackUpdate

:messages

To remove a plugin installed with minpac

  1. Remove the call minpac#add('author/plugin-name') from your .vimrc
  2. Save the .vimrc 
source %
  1. Then invoke the clean function from minpac
call minpac#clean()

I wrote a custom minpac binding to invoke the clean function, see below.

:PackClean

Minpac stores plugins downloaded from git repositories in the following directories

$dots/editors/vim/vim/pack/minpac/start

or

$HOME/.vim/pack/minpac/start/

To generate help tag files for plugins maintained by minpac

helptags ALL

When running minpac#update() tag files will be (re)generated.

Working with fzf in Vim & Neovim 🔝

TODO flesh out commands that can be used with fzf and Vim to search for specific contents within a project, ie. the source files that comprise a project.

In the meantime, use the_platinum_searcher to search for specific terms within source files, ie.

To search for a miss spelling of ProTypes within a React project

pt ProTypes

The above command will search through the entire project for the syntax error and print the offending file along with the line the error occurs on to STDOUT.

Working with Airline 🔝

Working with Deoplete 🔝

The below no longer applies to my setup because I switched to pyenv to manage pythons.

If Deoplete whines about missing neovim python module / plugin, run the below command

pip3 install --upgrade neovim

Working with Vimscript 🔝

To get help writing Vimscript

:help usr_40.txt
:help function-list

To do string equality on a variable using Vimscript

if actor ==? 'Michael Keaton'
  echom 'I am Batman!'
else
  echom 'No sir ree bob'
endif

==? performs case insensitive pattern matching ==# performs case sensitive pattern matching

When writing a function in Vimscript make sure the function name begins with a captial letter.

function MrFancyFucntion()
  echo "Hey, There"
endfunction

Find and Replace 🔝

To replace mr-fancy with mr-fancy-pants

:s/mr-fancy/mr-fancy-pants

To replace all occurrences of mr-fancy with mr-fancy-pants

:s/mr-fancy/mr-fancy-pants/g

Useful Links Vimscript 🔝

Writing Custom Code Folds 🔝

To get the current fold method being used in a vim buffer

:set foldmethod?

If the fold method is set to expr :set foldexpr? will print the current expr

To print the current fold expression for a particular file / buffer

:set foldexpr?

To get native vim help for fold expressions

:help fold-expr

To expand all code folds z+shift then o

To collapse all code folds z+shift then m

Useful Links Code Folds 🔝

Troubleshooting 🔝

If Vim or Neovim is getting sluggish when starting up, profile the start time

vim --startuptime ~/logs/nvim-boot-time.log

To see an example of bad or good startup time & performance

📸 ⌚︎ Profiling startup time

Vim startup time profiling

Useful Links

TODOs

  • ~~~do some research on vim-projectionist~~~

If you find any of this info helpful on your journey 🏍 click that 👆 ⭐️ star button. It sure makes me feel warm and fuzzy 🐻 on the inside.

Frequent Flyers ✈️

❤️ ~/.🛠🐈

Clone this wiki locally