User Interface

Vim can be made easier to use with a few tweaks to its user interface, as explained below. These are all included in the sample .vimrc configuration file. Note that separate pages deal with keystrokes and gui settings.

Syntax highlighting is A Good Thing, but only if the Vim binary being run has the facility, and only in terminals that can display colours:

if has('syntax') && (&t_Co > 2)
  syntax on
endif

Having fifty lines of command-line (and search expression) history to scroll through saves retyping previous commands:

set history=50

This is particularly useful when it is preserved between sessions. This command remembers all the command-line history, though makes do with just ten search expressions. It remembers info for ten files, though not those on removable disks, it doesn’t save file marks, and it doesn’t rehighlight previous search strings. It saves registers, but only up to 100 lines:

set viminfo=/10,'10,r/mnt/zip,r/mnt/floppy,f0,h,\"100

(According to the documentation, sticking @10 in there should limit the amount of input-buffer history it bothers to store, though this generates an error when I try it.)

<Tab> can be used for command-line completion of commands, help topics, option names, and filenames; an unambiguous partial name will be completed by pressing it once. With the following setting, pressing <Tab> after an ambiguous partial name will list the available options and complete as much as it can which is common to all the possibilities; further presses of <Tab> will then cycle through them:

set wildmode=list:longest,full

For example, after typing :help getw pressing <Tab> once will list the matching help topic names, ”getwinposx()” and “getwinposy()” and change the command line to read :help getwinpos, the longest common part. The second match can then be written in full either by pressing y (to make it unambiguous) then <Tab> to complete it, or simply by pressing <Tab> twice to cycle to it.

Having the current mode indicated in the status line can help avoid confusion, and in normal mode it can be useful to have partially-typed commands entered (so when doing something like gq3} you can see how much has been typed). These commands do this:

set showmode
set showcmd

When displaying file information (EG with <Ctrl>+G), using the abbreviation “RO” for “readonly” reduces the chance of it spilling over on to two lines and requiring a ‘hit return’ prompt:

set shortmess+=r

If list is being used to show non-printing characters, it can be nicer if instead of being shown as ^I, tab characters are represented by »··· (where the number of dots used fills out to the next tabstop):

execute 'set listchars+=tab:' . nr2char(187) . nr2char(183)

The mouse can be enabled in terminals (where possible) with:

set mouse=a

This means that the mouse can be used to move the cursor and make visual selections, like it does when using Vim’s gui. To use ‘ordinary’ XTerm-style select and paste mouse actions, hold down <Shift<. To prevent (other people’s?) files from being able to modify your nice Vim settings, do this:

set nomodeline

(If you want to have different Vim settings for different types of files, then do this properly — use autocommands.)