Neovim

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This page only deals with major differences between Neovim and Vim. See Vim page for general Vim-related information.

References

Install

See the guide Installing Neovim.

On Ubuntu, we install from Neovim repository, tracking HEAD: 

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:neovim-ppa/unstable
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install neovim

Default ini files are located at ~/.config/nvim/init.vim. To import Vim settings (FAQ :help nvim-from-vim) 

mkdir ~/.config
ln -s ~/.vim ~/.config/nvim
ln -s ~/.vimrc ~/.config/nvim/init.vim

Configure nvim as default vim alternative: 

sudo update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/vi vi /usr/bin/nvim 60
sudo update-alternatives --config vi
sudo update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/vim vim /usr/bin/nvim 60
sudo update-alternatives --config vim
sudo update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/editor editor /usr/bin/nvim 60
sudo update-alternatives --config editor

Install Ruby gems for Ruby support: 

sudo apt install ruby-dev
sudo gem install neovim

Install Python package for Python support: 

sudo pip install neovim

Build on debian

  • Get debian version
  • Download latest git.
  • Copy all files from git over the debian version
  • Disable the tests:
--- a/debian/rules
+++ b/debian/rules
@@ -52,5 +52,3 @@ debian/fakehome:
 override_dh_auto_test-indep:
 
 override_dh_auto_test-arch: debian/passwd debian/fakehome
-       mv -f test/functional/ex_cmds/global_spec.lua debian/
-       env "HOME=$(CURDIR)/debian/fakehome" LD_PRELOAD=libnss_wrapper.so "NSS_WRAPPER_PASSWD=$(CURDIR)/debian/passwd" "NSS_WRAPPER_GROUP=$(CURDIR)/debian/group" make $(UNITTEST) $(FUNCTIONALTEST) oldtest VERBOSE=1 USE_BUNDLED_DEPS=OFF
  • Then
debchange --newversion 0.2.0debian1-git20170619123516 --distribution unstable "Latest version"
dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot -b -d

Fixes / workarounds

  • Broken vertical mode (see below for fix).

NeoVim GUI

For now, there are no official GUI for Neovim (like gvim). Potential candidates are (see also Neovim related projects):

  • neovim-qt
  • NyaoVim (an advanced Electron UI based client)
  • ONI (another Electron UI based client)
  • Use a customized terminal (like Gnome-Terminal)

Criteria for a good GUI:

  • Be fast (fast refresh, no jitter in scrolling).
  • Drop-in compatible with gvim / vim.
  • True color and italic support.
  • Blinking cursor (mandatory) and block/caret mode (optional).
Blinking cursor is necessary when using incsearch plugin (or we miss some hightlights).

Terminator + neovim

The best and simplest solution. We use terminator as a gui.

Create the script ngvim: 

#! /bin/bash
# Redirect stderr to silent error on keyboard binding failure
2> /dev/null exec /usr/bin/terminator -m --p nvim -i /usr/local/icons/neovim.png -u -x nvim "$@"

This script:

  • Sets terminal icon to neovim's.
  • Tell terminator to wait until application exits (equivalent to gvim -f)
  • Tell terminator not to use Dbus (such that to always appear above current windows).

The advantage of this script is that we use the same back-end as the terminal, and hence we will have the same experience (same features, same bugs).

NyaoVim / ONI

For now I discard these clients. These clients introduce additional features that I don't necessarily want.

neovim-qt

Build from source. Bindings seem old, so we rebuild them: 

mkdir build
cd build
cmake ..
make bindings
cmake --build .
Issues
  • Cursor not blinking! Using QT API app.setCursorFlashTime(1000); does not help.
  • Message Unknown Neovim function "Array vim_get_api_info()". Due to missing/additional bindings. If necessary, we can mute this message in src/function.cpp.

Custom terminal - Gnome-Terminal

The best I could do so far is to create a script gnvim that uses gnome-terminal as window, sets title to NeoVim, and sets icon using xseticon.

To install gnvim:

  • Copy neovim icon to /usr/local/icons/neovim.png. For instance, there is an icon in neovim-qt.git:
git clone https://github.com/equalsraf/neovim-qt.git
sudo mkdir -p /usr/local/icons
sudo cp neovim-qt/third-party/neovim.png /usr/local/icons
  • Create file gnvim, and make it executable:
#! /bin/bash
# We add a sleep 1 because of race condition between xseticon and echo
gnome-terminal --geometry 132x50 --hide-menubar -x bash -c "echo -ne '\033]0;NeoVim\007'; ((sleep 1; xseticon -name NeoVim /usr/local/icons/neovim.png)&); exec nvim $*"
  • To add NeoVim GUI as a desktop application, create the file ~/.local/share/applications/neovim.desktop:
#!/usr/bin/env xdg-open

[Desktop Entry]
Version=1.0
Type=Application
Terminal=false
Exec=/home/peetersm/bin/ngvim
Name=NeoVim
Comment=The future of Vim
Icon=/usr/local/icons/neovim.png

Then 

chmod a+x ~/.local/share/applications/neovim.desktop

Neovim Gnome-Terminal wrapper

Small wrapper in Python, but it only sets the icon in unity bar, not task switcher.

Tips

Use :term for Read–eval–print loop (REPL)

This can be easily done using a new buffer (C-w v) and a terminal (:term), and then

  • Use watch:
watch 'make this && less that'
  • Use entr:
echo myfile myotherfile | entr make this

Neovim features

Just a couple of things I should not forget exist.

  • Powerful terminal emulation.
  • Quick :term git status.
  • Use terminal for easy REPL.
  • More workflow examples on reddit and SO.
  • Incremental substitution (set inccommand=split) (see here).

Troubleshooting

Known GOOD version

  • neovim_0.2.0ubuntu1+git201707091951+3517+26~ubuntu16.04.1_amd64.deb
  • neovim_0.2.0ubuntu1+git201705081829+3414+24~ubuntu16.04.1_amd64.deb
  • neovim_0.1.7ubuntu1+git201704230032+3359+23~ubuntu16.04.1_amd64.deb
  • neovim_0.1.7ubuntu1+git201703230754+3253+23~ubuntu16.04.1_amd64.deb
  • neovim_0.1.7ubuntu1+git201703122001+3207+23~ubuntu16.04.1_amd64.deb
  • neovim_0.1.5ubuntu1+git201612110104+2963+22~ubuntu16.04.1_amd64.deb

Known BROKEN version

  • neovim_0.2.0ubuntu1+git201706190001+3482+26~ubuntu16.04.1_amd64.deb
  • Issue: broken vertical split
  • Issue fixed: See #6816 and #6802

Fix broken vertical mode

Due to bad TERM or COLORTERM env variables #6816 and #6802

Currently I have:
# On gnome-terminal:
echo $TERM / $COLORTERM
# xterm-256color /

# On terminator:
echo $TERM / $COLORTERM
# xterm-256color / truecolor

The fix is to either unset TERM, or set it to gnome-256color, or set COLORTERM to gnome-terminal.

Gnome-Terminal

To fix on Gnome-terminal [1]: 

dconf write '/org/gnome/terminal/legacy/profiles:/:b1dcc9dd-5262-4d8d-a863-c897e6d979b9/custom-command' "'env COLORTERM=gnome-terminal /bin/bash'"
dconf write '/org/gnome/terminal/legacy/profiles:/:b1dcc9dd-5262-4d8d-a863-c897e6d979b9/use-custom-command' "true"
# Verify:
dconf dump /org/gnome/terminal/legacy/profiles:/

Changing TERM breaks too many application, so we change instead COLORTERM.

Terminator

We can apply the same trick. Or we can patch terminatorlib/config.py: 

-                'colorterm'             : 'truecolor',
+                'term'                  : 'gnome-terminal',

Changing TERM breaks too many application, so we change instead COLORTERM.

Midnight commander

Changing TERM impacts Midnight Commander. Force xterm mode with mc -x. This is no longer needed if we keep TERM as is.

True color and italic support

See xterm.

Regarding terminal support:

Meta/Alt-key mappings choke (when typed too fast)

See bug #2454.

The solution is too actually install the plugin vim-sensible, contrary to what says :CheckHealth.

This plugins set ttimeoutlen to 100, which is sufficient to have alt-key mappings to act correctly in TUI.

Update
  • Now vim-sensible disables ttimeout when it detects neovim :-(. See vim-sensible/#141.

nvim-qt issues

No blinking cursor in nvim-qt

Adding call to QApplication::setCursorFlashTime() in main.cpp does not help. See issue #208.

No support for option 'S' and '-c'

See #224.

Cursor (sometimes) stops blinking

Neovim hard-codes cursor shape and mode. This is tracked in tickets #5740, #5556. See also [Cursor stops blinking #3257], and #4867.

The solution is to use :set guicursor: 

:set guicursor=n-v-c:block,i-ci-ve:ver25,r-cr:hor20,o:hor50, \
              n-v-c:blinkwait700-blinkoff400-blinkon250, \
              sm:block-blinkwait175-blinkoff150-blinkon175

Undefined variable: self

See issue #5763.

Last known good version without this bug for me: neovim_0.1.5ubuntu1+git201612110104+2963+22~ubuntu16.04.1_amd64.deb.

Bug fixed, but must update all plugins (:PlugUpdate) and vim-plug itself (with :PlugUpgrade).

incsearch plugin broken

See issue #125.

Shift-enter not working in TUI

This requires a terminal that can configure CSI (like iTerm2). Maybe [pangoterm] is another option.

See also:

Neovim not resizing correctly in Terminator on split

See bug 6156.

"E724: unable to correctly dump variable with self-referencing container" when using incsearch

See bug 5902. My fork on GitHub contains a workaround.

To Do

  • Find a good TUI or GUI
  • Test advanced linters plugins like neomake and syntactics.
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