One thing Vim users love about their favorite text editor is it's seemingly endless extensibility. On top of configuring basic mappings, settings, and behaviors in your .vimrc, there are a ton of awesome plugins that extend Vim's functionality. As someone who has been using Vim as his primary editor for about 7 years now, I'm going to share some of the ones that I think are important for any Vim user.
- Vundle is an excellent system built on the same principles as Pathogen, but with an integrated plugin management system that is Git and Github aware. Spf13-vim uses the Vundle plugin management system to have a well organized vim directory (Similar to mac's app folders).
- NERDTree, Ranger, and No plugin ('explore' command) are probably your best bets out of the 9 options considered. 'Supports most of the file operations' is the primary reason people pick NERDTree over the competition. This page is powered by a knowledgeable community that helps you make an informed decision.
- Plugins with Vim-Plug. Installing Neovim. Make directory for your Neovim config. Create an init.vim file. Install vim-plug.
- I need a mac person to tell me how to get a shared library working on the Mac. I've included a first cut at it with Makefile.mac (under.vim/gdbmgr/src) Integration with vim and gdb is provided by the plugin itself via vim's libcall function and a small shared library written in C (code provided).
Vim-win32-installer It supports many interfaces, such as Perl, Tcl, Lua, Python and Ruby. There are also 64bit versions which only run on 64 bit MS-Windows and use a lot more memory, but is compatible with 64 bit plugins. You can also get a nightly build from there with the most recent improvements, with a small risk that something is broken.
Installing and Managing Plugins
Before moving onto the plugins I want to cover, let's talk about how to actually install and manage plugins in Vim. There are multiple ways to do this.
Native Package Support in Vim 8
As of the release of Vim 8, Vim now has built in support for packages, which you can use to install these plugins. In this post, I will be linking a GitHub repository for each plugin I talk about. With Vim 8 packages, you can clone most of these and add them that way.
Vim will consider any directory under ~/.vim/pack to be a package. These packages can have a start directory in which plugins are loaded on startup, and an opt directory with plugins that need to be loaded manually with the command :packadd.
For most plugins, you can git clone their repository directly to ~/.vim/pack/start or ~/.vim/pack/opt to add them. You can also use Git submodules to manage them, as described in this blog post.
Using a Plugin Manager such as Vundle
There are also automated plugin managers for Vim like Vundle or vim-plug which are developed by the community. You'll need one of these if you are using an older version of Vim, but even as a Vim 8 user they are still useful in that they provide extra features and might make things easier if you are going to be using a lot of plugins.
I have personally used Vundle a lot over the years, so let's walk through how to set that up. You can think of this as the zero index in the array of awesome Vim plugins covered in this post.
Vundle requires Git to function, so make sure you have that installed on your machine. If you are a Windows user, the maintainers wrote a detailed guide for installing it on Windows. On Unix based systems, you can install it by running the following command:
And then adding the following lines to your .vimrc:
You can install plugins by launching Vim and running :PluginInstall. If you want to automate the installation of Vundle in your .vimrc, for example when setting up on a fresh machine, you can add something like the following script, found in this blog post:
This will automatically make sure you have Vundle, and all of your plugins, set up whenever you run Vim. Now let's get to the good stuff!
Syntastic
Syntastic is a syntax checking plugin for Vim which runs files through external syntax checkers and displays resulting errors. You can install Syntastic with Vundle by adding the following line to your .vimrc in the #begin and #end Vundle calls:
As you can see here when I make a typo, in this case spelling Flask as Flaks, Syntastic will pick up on this and point out the errors when I write the file. If there is an actual syntax error, such as a missing colon for an if statement, this will also be flagged. It will even add an underscore at the end of the line to point out where the problem is.
You can configure Syntastic's settings quite a bit. Try entering the command :help syntastic for more info on that. Here are some basic default settings I'd recommend adding to your .vimrc to get you started:
With these enabled, here's what it looks like when you open a file with an error in it. Another buffer is opened in a horizontal split with information on the error, and goes away once you fix it.
Here is a manual of what syntax checkers Syntastic is compatible with, so make sure you have the appropriate one installed for the language you are using. For Python I use flake8, which also has its own Vim plugin. You can install flake8 by running pip install flake8 with the pip that corresponds to whatever version of Python you are using.
Fugitive
Fugitive is a Git wrapper for Vim that is self-described as 'so awesome, it should be illegal.' You can install Fugitive with Vundle by adding the following line to your .vimrc in the #begin and #end Vundle calls:
With Fugitive you can run :Git, or even just :G followed by an arbitrary Git command to run that command directly from Vim and have the output echoed in a stream. This works particularly well with commands that don't have a lot of output.
For example, here is the simple functionality of adding the changes of the file you're currently working on to prepare for a commit.
One of my favorite features is that when you use the :Gblame command it will open a buffer in a vertical split with all of the git blame annotations side by side with the lines of the file you are working on. And the scrolling is even bound between them!
Looks like I only have myself to blame for that one. If you want to see more, this VimCast is an excellent demo that covers a lot of cool aspects of Fugitive.
NERDTree
The NERDTree is a file system explorer for Vim that can be used to visually browse complex directory hierarchies, quickly open files for reading or editing, and perform basic file system operations.
You can install NERDTree with Vundle by adding the following line to your .vimrc in the #begin and #end Vundle calls:
By running the :NERDTree command, you open up another buffer that is vertically split to the side of your current file, displaying the current directory and allowing you to navigate the filesystem in general and open other files.
NERDTree doesn't create any shortcuts itself outside its own window, so it doesn't interfere with any other shortcuts you already have. But you can add some keyboard shortcuts to your .vimrc for some NERDTree commands. For example:
Here are some things you can add to your .vimrc to customize the behavior of how NERDTree works:
Mac Vim Plugins Free
There are even NERDTree plugins such as this one that adds icons next to files based on their filetype. In Vim, even the plugins have plugins that are customizable.
Emmet
Emmet is an extremely useful plugin for web developers. It makes writing and editing HTML, and any language with tags, much easier. You can install Emmet with Vundle by adding the following line to your .vimrc in the #begin and #end Vundle calls:
You can expand any tags you want, and even use some built in common commands, like html:5, by typing <c-y>, (Ctrl+y+,).
Here's a quick tutorial showing various things you can use Emmet to do. As with any Vim plugin, you can customize its behavior in your .vimrc. Here are some examples:
Airline
Airline is a 'lean & mean status/tabline for vim that's light as air' and it has already been demonstrated in the screenshots from all of the other examples in this post. You can see here how the status line changes as I enter different modes, and provides a lot of contextual information as well.
This line consists of several sections, each one displaying some piece of information. By default (without configuration) it will have this layout:
- A: displays the mode + additional flags like crypt/spell/paste (INSERT)
- B: Environment status (VCS information - branch, hunk summary (master), battery level)
- C: filename + read-only flag (~/.vim/vimrc RO)
- X: filetype
- Y: file encoding[fileformat] (utf-8[unix])
- Z: current position in the file
- [..]: additional sections (warning/errors/statistics) from external plugins (e.g. YCM, syntastic, ..)
You can install Airline with Vundle by adding the following line to your .vimrc in the #begin and #end Vundle calls:
:wq!
Hopefully you've found some of these interesting or helpful. A lot of these are well known in the Vim community, but they are some of the plugins that I think are must-haves for any Vim user. In the future I am going to write another post on some lesser known plugins.
As a Vim enthusiast, I am always looking forward to hearing about more things I can add to my .vimrc. I don't consider myself an expert so there is a whole world of Vim sorcery to discover! Feel free to contact me about some Vim tricks that you think are cool, ask questions about any of these, or want to express your undying anger at any of my suggestions:
- Email: sagnew@twilio.com
- Twitter: @Sagnewshreds
- Github: Sagnew
- Twitch (streaming live code): Sagnewshreds
| MS-Windows: | Click this link to download the self-installing executable(using ftp). Signed MS-Windows files are available on thevim-win32-installer site(gvim_8.2.0012_x86_signed.exe is recommended) |
| Unix: | See the GitHub page, or Mercurial, if you prefer that.There is also anAppimagewhich is build daily and runs on many Linux systems. |
| Mac: | See the MacVim project for a GUI version and Homebrew for a terminal version |
Details and options for:
| Mirrors | Alternative sites to download Vim files from. |
| Sources | Build Vim yourself and/or make changes. |
| GitHub | Obtain Vim sources with a git client (recommended). |
| Mercurial | Obtain Vim sources with a Mercurial client(recommended if you don't like git). |
| Patches | Include the latest improvements (requires sources and rebuilding). |
| Runtime | Get the latest syntax files, documentation, etc. |
| Script links | Links to individual syntax, indent, color, compiler and ftplugin scripts. |
| Translations | Non-English documentation packages. |
Versions before 7.3 can also be obtained withSubversionandCVS.Vim 8.2 is the latest stable version. It is highly recommended, many bugs have been fixed since previous versions.If you have a problem with it (e.g.,when it's too big for your system), you could try version 6.4 or 5.8 instead.
To avoid having to update this page for every new version, there arelinks to the directories. From there select the files you want to download.In the file names ## stands for the version number. For example,vim##src.zipwith version 8.2 is vim82src.zip andvim-##-src.tar.gz for version 8.2is vim-8.2-src.tar.gz.Links are provided for quick access to the latest version.
Note that the links point to the latest version (currently 8.2) to avoidthat caching causes you to get an older version.
You need to download at the sources and the runtime files.And apply all the latest patches.For Vim 6 up to 7.2 you can optionally get the 'lang' archive, which adds translated messages and menus. For 7.3 and later this is included with the runtime files.
The explanations are on the GitHub page.
Summary:
Mac Vim Plugins Free
The explanations are on this page:Mercurial
Summary:
| The runtime and source files together: | vim-##.tar.bz2 | vim-8.2.tar.bz2 (ftp) |
The single big file ending in '.tar.bz2' is a tar archive compressed withbzip2. Uncompress and unpack it withbunzip2 -c filename | tar -xf -.
All archives should be unpacked in the same directory.
If you can't compile yourself or don't want to, look at the site of thesupplier of your Unix version for a packaged Vim executable. For Linuxdistributions and FreeBSD these are often available shortly after a new Vimversion has been released. But you can't change the features then.
- Debian packages are available at:http://packages.debian.org/vim.
- Sun Solaris Vim is included in the Companion Software:http://wwws.sun.com/software/solaris/freeware/.
Vim for other Sun systems can be found athttp://sunfreeware.com/. - HPUX with GTK GUI for various HPUX versions:http://hpux.its.tudelft.nl/hppd/hpux/Editors/vim-6.2/ orhttp://hpux.connect.org.uk/hppd/hpux/Editors/vim-6.2/ (note that the remark about the GNU GPL is wrong)
gvim82.exe (ftp)
It includes GUI and console versions, for 32 bit and 64 bit systems.You can select what you want to install and includes an uninstaller.
If you want a signed version you can get a build from
vim-win32-installer
It supports many interfaces, such as Perl, Tcl, Lua, Python and Ruby.There are also 64bit versions which only run on 64 bit MS-Windows and use alot more memory, but is compatible with 64 bit plugins.
You can also get a nightly build from there with the most recent improvements,with a small risk that something is broken.
Since there are so many different versions of MS operating systems, there areseveral versions of Vim for them.
For Vim 5.x, Vim 6.x and Vim 7 look inthe pc directory (ftp).
- Self-installing executable gvim##.exe gvim82.exe (ftp)
- For Vim 6 and later. This includes a GUI versionof Vim - with many features and OLE support - and all the runtime files.It works well on MS-Windows 95/98/ME/NT/2000/XP/Vista/7.Use this if you have enough disk space and memory. It's the simplest way tostart using Vim on the PC. The installer allows you to skip the parts youdon't want.
For Vim 6.3 and later it also includes a console version, both for MS-Windows 95/98/ME and MS-Windows NT/2000/XP/Vista/7. The installer automatically selects the right one.
Mac Vim Plugins List
- Runtime files vim##rt.zip vim82rt.zip (ftp)
- For all the following binary versions you need this runtime archive, whichincludes the documentation, syntax files, etc. Always get this, unless youuse the self-installing executable.
There are three versions that run as an MS-Windows application. These providemenus, scrollbars and a toolbar.
- GUI executable gvim##.zip gvim82.zip (ftp)
- This is the 'normal' GUI version.
- OLE GUI executable gvim##ole.zip gvim82ole.zip (ftp)
- A GUI version with OLE support. This offers a few extra features,such as integration with Visual Developer Studio. But it uses quite a bitmore memory.
- Win32 console executable vim##w32.zip vim82w32.zip (ftp)
- The Win32 console version works well on MS-Windows NT/2000/XP/Vista/7. It supports long file names and is compiled with 'big' features. It does not runperfectly well on MS-Windows 95/98/ME, especially when resizing the consolewindow (this may crash MS-Windows..).
- 32 bit DOS executable vim##d32.zip vim73_46d32.zip (ftp)
- The 32 bit DOS version works well on MS-Windows 95/98/ME. It requires a DPMImanager, which needs to be installed on MS-DOS. MS-Windows already has one.It supports long file names, but NOT on MS-Windows NT/2000/XP/Vista/7. It is compiled with 'big' features.
Not available for 7.4 and later. - 16 bit DOS executable vim##d16.zip vim71d16.zip (ftp)
- The 16 bit DOS version is the only one that runs on old MS-DOS systems. Onlyuse this if you are really desparate, because it excludes many useful features(such as syntax highlighting and long file names) and quickly runs out ofmemory.
The last version available is 7.1. Version 7.2 and later are too big to fit in the DOS memory model.
- iconv librarylibiconv
- A library used for converting character sets.Put 'iconv.dll' in the same directory as gvim.exe to be able to edit files inmany encodings. You can find the dll file in the bin directory of the'libiconv-win32' archive.
- newer intl librarylibintl
- The included libintl.dll does not support encoding conversion.If you have installed the iconv library, as mentioned above, you can install agettext library that uses it.Get 'intl.dll' from the bin directory in the gettext-win32 archive and store itas 'libintl.dll' in the same directory as gvim.exe, overwriting the filethat may already be there.
- PC sources vim##src.zip vim82src.zip (ftp)
- The source files, packed for the PC. This only includes the files needed onthe PC, not for other systems. The files are in dos format CR-LF.
- PC debug files gvim##.pdb gvim82.pdb (ftp) gvim##ole.pdb gvim82ole.pdb (ftp) vim##w32.pdb vim80w32.pdb (ftp)
- When you notice a bug or a crash in Vim these files can be used to help tracing down the problem. In Vim 7 do ':help debug-win32' to see how.
- PC translations vim##lang.zip vim72lang.zip (ftp)
- Only for 7.2 and earlier, for 7.3 and later these are included in the 'rt' archive.Translated messages and menu files, packed for the PC. Use this to seenon-English menus. The messages are only translated when the libintl.dlllibrary is installed.
- Windows 3.1 GUI executable gvim##w16.zip and gvim##m16.zip
- These are GUI versions for 16 bit windows (Windows 3.1). The 'w16' has manyfeatures, 'm16' has few features (for when you're short on memory).
Alternate distributions
- Yongwei's build
- You may also try Yongwei's build,executables with slightly different interfaces supported.
- Cream
- For an unofficial version that used to include all the latest patches andoptionally a bitmore: Cream.The 'one-click installer' mentioned includes the Cream changes.For the 'real Vim' use the 'without Cream' version listed further down.
Unfortunately, it stopped updating since Vim 8.0.
- Cygwin
- For a Cygwin binary look at others.
For Vim 5.x and Vim 6 look inthe amiga directory (ftp).
Vim 7 files can be found atos4depot.net. This is for AmigaOS 4. Made by Peter Bengtsson.
- Runtime files vim##rt.tgz vim64rt.tgz (ftp)
- Documentation, syntax files, etc. You always need this.
- Executable vim##bin.tgz vim64bin.tgz (ftp)
- The executables for Vim and Xxd.For Vim 6 it includes 'big' features, for Vim 5.x itincludes the normal features.For Vim 6.2 it is not available (my Amiga had harddisk problems then, this miraculously healed later).
- Big executable vim##big.tgz
- Vim with 'big' features and Xxd. Only for Vim 5.x.
- Sources vim##src.tgz vim64src.tgz (ftp)
- The source files for the Amiga.Only needed when you want to compile Vim yourself.
For Vim 5.x and Vim 6 look inthe os2 directory (ftp).Version 6.2 is not available.Versions 6.3 and 6.4 were compiled by David Sanders.
Version 7.0 was compiled by David Sanders.
- Runtime files vim##rt.zip vim70rt.zip (ftp)
- Documentation, syntax files, etc. You always need this.
- Executables vim##os2.zip vim70os2.zip (ftp)
- Vim, Xxd, Tee and EMX libraries.
If you want to compile the OS/2 version, you need the EMX compiler. Use theUnix source archive, runtime files and the extra archive. After unpacking theruntime archive, move all the files and directories in the 'runtime'directory one level up.
The terminal version of Vim is included as 'vi', you already have it. It'slagging behind a bit though and has limited features, thus you may want toadditionally install a recent version or one with more features.MacVim
There most popular version is MacVim. This is being actively developed. Thisbehaves like a Mac application, using a GUI.MacVim has more a Mac look and feel, is developed actively and most peopleprefer this version. Most of MacVim was made by Björn Winckler.
MacVim can be downloaded here: https://github.com/macvim-dev/macvim
New versions are made quite often.Subscribe to thevim-mac maillistto be informed about bugs and updates.
Homebrew
This is a terminal version installed with the 'brew' command.It is updated frequently.It can be downloaded here: formulae.brew.sh/formula/vim.Older
Adobe illustrator cs5 mac free download. Older binaries for Mac OS/X can be found on thisSourceForge project.Maintained by Nicholas Stallard.
Here is a multi-byte version of Vim 5.7 (for Japanese, possibly also forKorean and Chinese; not for Unicode):
http://www-imai.is.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp/~asai/macvim-e.html
Background
Most of the work forthe Macintosh port (Classic and Carbon) was done by Dany St-Amant.
If you have OSX and a setup for compiling programs, you can use the source codeand compile yourself. See the Unix section above. The development tools can bedownloaded from Apple's developer web site.
Turn to the vim-mac maillist to meet otherVim-Mac users.
This is a list of links to sites where various versions of Vim can be obtained.These are supported by individuals, use at your own risk.| Android | Search for 'Vim Touch' by Momodalo in the Play Store. |
| i/OS | Run Vim on your iPhone or Ipad. |
| QNX (ftp) | Provided by Yakov Zaytsev. Requires QNX 6.3.0/6.3.2 with service pack 2. |
| Agenda | http://pi7.fernuni-hagen.de/hartrumpf/agenda/vim/vim.vr3 |
| Cygwin (with GTK GUI) | http://lassauge.free.fr/cygwin/ |
| Open VMS | http://www.polarhome.com/vim/ |
| MorphOS | http://www.akcaagac.com/index_vim.html |
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