VIM_CONFIG

INTRODUCTION

This is a vim configuration created by duwanis. It includes a few niceties for Ruby/Rails development, as well as a few MacVim/Gui specific options - but is mostly composed of general tools to improve the Vim editing experience. The one exception is that this configuration necessitates a *nix system (Mac OS X, Linux, etc.) in order to work properly. But you're probably on *nix anyway if you want to use Vim, so that's probably not a big deal.

A couple of the plugins (namely, Command-T and Conque) require Vim to be compiled with Ruby and/or Python support in order to operate correctly. Be aware of that if you run into any problems.

NEWBIE-FRIENDLY

This config is written to be newbie-friendly - basically, when I introduce someone to Vim, I want to be able to say "go through the vim tutorial, then copy my config, read the README, and you'll be good to go." So I've tried to be explicit here, but you shouldn't expect to pick this config up and run with it if you've never used Vim before - go through the vim tutorial (:help vimtutor) first, at least. :)

INSTALLATION

Though you'll probably want to just examine this vim config to see what I've used, if you're TOTALLY new to vim, you might want to install it and try it out yourself. That's cool. Here's how:

Fork this repository (so you have your own copy for when you want to make changes).
Install the homesick gem (this makes it really easy): sudo gem install homesick
Install your copy of the vim_config repository using homesick: homesick clone your_github_username/vim_config (assuming you cloned it on github)
Symlink it using homesick: homesick symlink your_github_username/vim_config
Done.
...unless you want to use command-T, which requires that you build some stuff first.
cd ~/.vim/bundle/commandT/ruby/command-t && /usr/bin/ruby extconf.rb && make takes care of that, though.

FEATURES

Currently, this vim configuration ships with the following plugins:

You can follow the links above to see the original source of each included plugin, but I've also described them later in this document.

Each plugin is pulled in as a git submodule, so you can stay up-to-date on the latest developments.

STRUCTURE

This vim config makes use of Tim Pope's pathogen plugin, which allows all other plugins to be split into their own individual folders rather than jumbled together in vim's default locations. This means that if you want to copy this config but don't like a few of the plugins, you can very easily identify what needs to be removed.

bundle - this is the special folder pathogen uses to store plugins.
external - any submodules that aren't kept in bundle will go here. As of right now, pathogen is the only thing here.
config - this is where all the custom config files are kept. If you look in the vimrc file, you'll see where everything in this folder is loaded recursively (even subfolders, if you're obsessive about organizing your config settings).
config/private - this folder is included in .gitignore in case you have some personal stuff that you don't want to share (for example, if you want to blog using vim, but you don't want to keep your username and password in a git repository somewhere :D).

GENERAL SETTINGS

in Vim, you can define a mapleader key, which you can then use for keybindings. I personally prefer to use the semicolon (';') for the mapleader, since it's right there on the home row. If you'd like to change it to something else (it defaults to '\', and I know several people who prefer the comma (',')), you can find that setting in the vimrc file. For the rest of this README I'll use <Leader> to indicate a keybinding that makes use of the mapleader - e.g. <Leader>t means hit <Leader> (the semicolon, unless you've changed it) and then the t key.
Vim's default navigation keys - h,j,k, and l, can be used to navigate between windows if preceded by Ctrl-W. I do this often enough (and hate hitting Ctrl enough) that I've created bindings to do this with the mapleader: <Leader>h,<Leader>j,<Leader>k, and <Leader>l.
Control-k and Control-j are mapped to move lines up/down.
In a similar fashion, I've created bindings for :w! and :q! : <Leader>w and <Leader>q.
You can toggle spellchecking with <Leader>zs. It's nice when you're writing prose, but annoying when you're coding.
Every once in a while I open a file that I don't have write access to (a file that Root owns, for example), make some changes, and go to save only to find out that I don't have the appropriate permissions. Thanks to vim/config/sudoW, you can run :SudoW to write to the file with sudo (assuming you're lucky enough to be in the sudoers file on whatever machine you're using, anyway ;)).
Tab-completion is enabled on the command-line (:...), the settings for this are found in vim/config/completion.vim.
General display settings (color theme, statusbar, etc.) can be found in vim/config/display.vim.
General editing settings (indentation settings, etc.) can be found in vim/config/editing.vim.).
GUI-specific settings are located in vim/config/gui.vim.
Search-related settings (incremental search, highlighting of search terms, and the like) are found in vim/config/search.vim.
Temporary files are kept in one central location so that they don't clutter your project folders. Rather than warning you when you open a file that already has a swapfile (e.g. a file that's open in another vim session), vim should now quietly let you edit the file, which is much less annoying. These settings can be found in vim/config/tempfiles.vim.

PLUGINS

Ack.vim

Ack is better than grep. Ack.vim lets you use Ack to search in the current directory. It then loads the results into Vim's "quickfix" window for easy browsing. <Leader>A (note that's Shift-a) is configured to bring Ack up ready to search in .vim/config/ack.vim.

Align.vim

Align.vim is an interesting plugin that allows you to auto-format lines so that they are all aligned on a given separator. As an example, given the lines: itemA = itemB item12345 = item23456 someCrazyCamelCasedJavaStuff = some_underscored_stuff_instead

You can run (assuming they're at the top of the file) the command 1,3Align= to get: itemA = itemB item12345 = item23456 someCrazyCamelCasedJavaStuff = some_underscored_stuff_instead

Whether or not you prefer to write your code this way is, of course, up to you.

AsNeeded

AsNeeded allows plugins, bindings, functions, etc. to be loaded on a (surprise!) as-needed basis. Its biggest advantage is that it reduces the initial load time for vim - in my case by somewhere around 66%. If you add any new plugins, you'll want to be sure to run the :MkAsNeeded command so that they get parsed.

AutoClose

Autoclose monitors when you type paired characters (like ", (, etc.) and automatically places the closing character for you. e.g. you can type " and autoclose will automatically change it to "|" (where the '|' in this case represents your cursor location). If you don't want to use autoclose in a certain situation, you can use the <Leader>a binding to toggle it.

BufExplorer

BufExplorer is a quick way to switch around between windows. You can run :help bufexplorer to see the full information, or just make use of the <Leader>be keybinding to bring up the BufExplorer window while you've got a few buffers open to see it in action.

BufExplorer is configured in vim/config/bufexplorer.vim

BufOnly

BufOnly is a simple plugin that closes all buffers but the currently open one. Useful for when you've got a bunch of buffers open that aren't pertinent any more (e.g. you're switching to a different project now, etc.). I've mapped the BufOnly command to the <Leader>bo keychain.

CamelCaseMotion

CamelCaseMotion defines keybindings for motions that work on camel-case words (and underscore-separated words). e.g., by default, w goes to the end of the word, even if that word is CamelCasedLikeThis. Using CamelCaseMotion, you can use ,w to move to the next part of the CamelCasedWord. :help camelcasemotion for more information.

Command-T

In the Mac OS X application TextMate, you can use Cmd-t to do a 'fuzzy' search for files in your current working directory. Command-T is a plugin that duplicates this functionality - using <Leader>t by default. Just start typing and you'll see it in action. The config settings I've made are in vim\config\commandt.vim.

Conque

Conque is awesome. It allows you to run (and interact with) any executable inside vim. This means that you can run a shell, irb, script/console, or any similar tool inside of a vim buffer. I've got a few default bindings set up as follows (each of these, by default, opens the new buffer in a new horizontally-split window):

<Leader>ss - this starts your $SHELL in a new buffer.
<Leader>sc - this starts ./script/console in a new buffer.
<Leader>si - this starts irb in a new buffer.
<Leader>sx - this starts... whatever you want :) it prompts you to enter the executable you want to run, and then starts it in a new buffer.

dbext.vim

Dbext is a very powerful plugin that provides database integration with vim. For the most part, this is included because Rails.vim plays very nicely with it, but you can also use it on its own if you prefer.

Endwise

Endwise attempts to intelligently insert 'end' in Ruby/VimL. It's likely not useful if you're working with other languages.

Fugitive

Fugitive is an awesome git wrapper for Vim. When you're working in a git repository, the following keybindings are available for you:

<Leader>gs - bring up Fugitive's GitStatus window.
<Leader>gc - bring up a window for committing the current changes to git.
<Leader>gp - push your changes to origin master.

I also added a couple of git-svn keychains:

<Leader>gnd - git svn dcommit (push your git revisions to subversion)
<Leader>gnr - git svn rebase (pull the latest from subversion and integrate it with your local changes)

:help fugitive will let you browse the full documentation for fugitive.

You can also check the configuration changes I made in vim/config/fugitive.vim.

Gist.vim

Gist.vim is a simple plugin for integrating with Github's code-sharing service, Gist. :Gist to post the current buffer to a new gist, :Gist -p posts a new private one, etc., etc. - check the plugin's vim.org page for more detailed instructions.

NERDCommenter

NERDCommenter is a nice plugin that allows you to comment/uncomment lines of code quickly and easily. I've set up a keybinding for it so that <Leader>c will toggle the comment status ofthe current line of code (that is, comment it if it's not already commented, or uncomment it if it is already commented). This also works with line-motion commands - for example, 3<Leader>c will comment the next 3 lines of code, G<Leader>c will comment every line until the end of the file, etc. You can run :help NERDCommenter to see the help info, and check out the config changes I've made in vim/config/nerdcommenter.vim.

NERDTree

NERDTree is a file-navigation buffer that works like the 'drawer' in other editors. It gives you quick and easy access to the file tree for your current working directory, a way to bookmark directories so that you can access them later, and lots of other nice functionality. <Leader>d is configured to toggle the 'drawer' buffer for you. You'll also want to check out the help - :help NERDTree, or simply press ? while you're in the NERDTree buffer to see the list of keyboard shortcuts you can use. The configuration for NERDTree is present in vim/config/nerdtree.vim.

Rake.vim

Rake.vim provides some of the nicer functionality from Rails.vim but for any ruby project, not just those that make use of Rails. :help rake for more information.

Rails.vim

Rails.vim provides a lot of nice functionality for working with Rails applications. There's a lot of really cool functionality that would take a while to explain - if you do any rails work, you should run :help rails-introduction and read up on everything that it offers.

I've made a couple of config changes to rails.vim (mostly changing the automatic 2-space setting that it uses for indentation, since I'm required to use 3 spaces at work), which can be found in vim/config/rails.vim.

repeat.vim

Vim comes with a native 'repeat' operator - the . key will repeat the last action executed. The problem is, this doesn't work for most plugins - if you hit . after executing something with surround.vim, for example, only the last native command will be repeated (not the whole process, like you wanted). Repeat.vim provides a way for plugins to hook into the . binding and use it correctly. Currently, only surround.vim provides support for this, but hopefully others will soon.

rvm.vim

rvm.vim allows you to place an indicator in your status line that determines which Ruby/Gemset you're currently using through RVM (the Ruby Version Manager). Although I highly recommend using RVM if you're a Rubyist, you can simply remove rvm.vim if you don't find this helpful.

SnipMate

SnipMate gives you snippets - pieces of often typed text you can insert into your document using a trigger word. Checkout the help files (:help snipmate) or view the plugin's website at vim.org for more specifics.

Solarized

Solarized is a "precision color scheme" that I've started using, and I really enjoy it. You can read more about it here. I make use of the dark version of the colorscheme, and I've loaded their sample presets into my terminal emulator of choice (iTerm2), so everything's nice and pretty whether I'm running in MacVim or out of the terminal.

Space.vim

Space.vim allows you to use the key as a repeat key for some complex motion commands (most notably for me, searching - I can search for something and then hit space to move forward and shift-space to move backwards through the results). Run :help space-intro to read up on it.

Surround.vim

Surround.vim allows you to do fancy things with surrounding characters/strings... it's really useful if you're working in a tag-based language like HTML or XML. I could describe it more fully here, but the help file has a more than sufficient explanation and tutorial: :help surround.

Syntastic

Syntastic provides syntax-checking for you when you load/write to a buffer. It has syntax checkers for several popular programming languages/markup languages (look in vim/syntax_checkers/ for the full list), and will automatically flag any errors/warnings it finds. You can check the helpfile for it at :help syntastic, and see the configuration settings I use in vim/config/syntastic.vim.

TailMinusF

TailMinusF allows you to open a buffer that watches the contents of a file in a similar fashion to the UNIX command tail -f (hence the name). This is mostly included as a dependency to Rails.vim, but you can use it on its own via the :Tail command.

VimOutliner

VimOutliner is a tool for creating outlines (.otl files). It's got some neat features, including automatically calculating the completion percentage of a given outline. There's a handy cheatsheet here.

YankRing

YankRing adds the equivalent of Emacs' "Kill Ring" to Vim. It wraps Vim's default yank/delete mechanisms and allows you to easily work with the last n items that you've put in Vim's registries - it's sort of a clipboard manager for Vim.

:help yankring will give you the full rundown as well as a tutorial.

You can also view the configuration I've set up by examining vim/config/yankring.vim.

netpenthe/vim_config