VimBits

Suite of lightweight Vim plugins.

1. HighlightOnYank - Confirm yank operation by temporarily highlighting the region.

2. EasyJump - Jump to any location on screen by typing two characters.

3. fFtT - Highlight characters reachable in one jump using f, t, F, and T commands.

4. Vim9Cmdline - Use vim9script in command-line seamlessley.

5. vimtips from zzapper - :h vimtips.txt

Requirements

• Vim 9.0 or higher

Installation

Install it via vim-plug.

Show instructions

Using vim9 script:

vim9script
plug#begin()
Plug 'girishji/vimbits'
plug#end()

Using legacy script:

call plug#begin()
Plug 'girishji/vimbits'
call plug#end()

Install using Vim's built-in package manager.

Show instructions

$ mkdir -p $HOME/.vim/pack/downloads/opt
$ cd $HOME/.vim/pack/downloads/opt
$ git clone https://github.com/girishji/vimbits.git

Add the following to your $HOME/.vimrc file.

packadd vimbits

Configuration

By default, all plugins are enabled except for Vim9Cmdline. To disable a specific plugin, set its corresponding global variable to false. To enable a plugin, set its corresponding global variable to true.

vim9script
g:vimbits_highlightonyank = true
g:vimbits_easyjump = true
g:vimbits_fFtT = true
g:vimbits_vim9cmdline = false

More configurable options pertaining to individual plugins are described below.

Plugin: HighlightOnYank

Ensure the text you intended to yank is correctly selected. This feature helps avoid surprises when pasting, especially if you accidentally hit the wrong keys.

The yanked region is temporarily highlighted (using :h hl-IncSearch) for 300 milliseconds by default. The duration and highlight group are configurable, and there's an option to disable highlighting in visual mode.

To customize the default settings, add the following to your .vimrc file:

vim9script
g:vimbits_highlightonyank = false  # Disables the default autocmd
import autoload 'vimbits/highlightonyank.vim' as hy
augroup HighlightOnYank
    autocmd!
    autocmd TextYankPost * hy.HighlightOnYank('IncSearch', 300, true)
augroup END

HighlightOnYank() accepts three arguments:

• hlgroup: The highlight group for the yanked region.
• duration: The duration of the highlight in milliseconds.
• in_visual: Whether to highlight the region when yanked in visual mode.

This mini plugin is inspired by this issue.

Plugin: EasyJump

Jump to any location on screen by typing two characters.

TL;DR

• s + <character> + <tag_character> to jump
• ds + <character> + <tag_character> to delete (similarly, vs for visual selection, cs for change, etc.)
• <Tab> and <S-Tab> (or ; and ,) after <character> to view additional tag characters
• 2s + <character_1> + <character_2> + <tag_character> to jump

Features

• Initially bound to s, but it can be reassigned to any desired trigger (e.g., ,).
• Supports essential Vim idioms such as ds for deletion, cs for change, vs for visual selection, and more. Here s is the trigger character.
• Updates the jump list (:jumps) for easy back-navigation using <c-o>.
• Optional two-character mode, for users accustomed to targeting with two characters instead of one.
• Non-disruptive: Does not modify the buffer. Crafted in vim9 script.

🚀 Jump (s): Type s followed by a character (say c). Witness new tag characters replacing the character c. Typing next character initiates the jump. For instance, typing e navigates the cursor to the c under e.

🚀 Jump back: Type <c-o> (control-O) to jump back. Type <tab> or <c-i> to jump forward.

🚀 Visual Select (vs): For visually selecting a block of text from the cursor position up to an instance of c, enter vsc, then the highlighted character (e.g., e).

Likewise, use ds for deletion or cs for text alteration.

Press <esc> to cancel the ongoing jump.

Pictures above are based on :colorscheme quiet.

🔎 What if the intended jump location is not showing a tag letter?

This scenario occurs when there aren't enough unique letters available for tagging. Simply press <Tab> (or ;), and new tag labels will fill the remaining spots. To cycle backwards, press <S-Tab> (or ,).

🚀 Two-Character Mode (New): Activated with 2s or simply s if g:easyjump_two_chars is configured as true.

• Use 2s + <character> + <tag_character> to leap to your destination (when a tag character marks the spot).
• If no tag label is present, type the adjacent character as well, forming 2s + <character_1> + <character_2> + <tag_character> to execute the jump.

Tip

A lazy way to navigate is by leveraging the space character as a guide. Experiment with typing s followed by <space>. The algorithm strives to allocate one label per line. Once you're near your desired location within a line, you can effectively employ Vim's built-in f/F, t/T commands to reach it precisely. This is an alternative to using relative line numbers to jump.

Trigger Key

By default, s serves as the trigger key. To unmap s and restore it to the default (:h s), include the following line in your .vimrc file:

g:easyjump_default_keymap = false

To assign , as the trigger for jumping, add the following lines to your .vimrc file. You can choose any other key beside ,.

nmap , <Plug>EasyjumpJump;
omap , <Plug>EasyjumpJump;
vmap , <Plug>EasyjumpJump;

Case Sensitivity

Options include 'case' (case sensitive), 'icase' (ignore case), or 'smart' (smart case). Add the following line to your .vimrc:

g:easyjump_case = 'smart' # Can be 'case', 'icase', or 'smart' (default).

Highlight Group

The tag letters displayed alongside destination locations utilize the highlighted group EasyJump. By default, this group is linked to IncSearch. Modify its appearance using the :highlight command to change colors.

Tag Letters

Jump locations prioritize placement based on distance from cursor and preference for having at least one placement per line. Letters are picked in the following sequence. Modify the sequence (say, for Dvorak) as needed. Set the following global variable:

g:easyjump_letters = 'asdfgwercvhjkluiopynmbtqxzASDFGWERCVHJKLUIOPYNMBTQXZ0123456789'

Plugin: fFtT

Characters that are reachable with a single jump are highlighted, while others are dimmed. This enhancement enhances the accuracy of navigation using f, F, t, and T commands. Moreover, you can prefix the command with a numerical [count] (e.g., 3f), which will exclusively highlight the [count]'th occurrence (third in this instance) of a character to the right of the cursor, while dimming the others.

This plugin does not alter Vim operators or commands. It solely focuses on highlighting relevant characters without making any changes to the default key mappings. The code consists of less than 100 lines, with explanatory comments.

The appearance of characters that are unreachable within one jump is determined by the highlight group FfTtSubtle, which is linked to the Comment group by default.

Plugin: Vim9Cmdline

vim9script offers significant improvements over the legacy script. Although there isn't a direct way to switch the command line to parse vim9script, you can execute vim9script commands by prepending each command with vim9. This plugin automates that process for you.

Some things to keep in mind:

• Remember that execution occurs in the global context, not the script-local context. This means you need to declare variables with the g: prefix, like g:foo = 'bar'.

• Common commands, such as visual range ('<,'>), other types of ranges, shell commands (!), substitution (s//), and global (g//), work as expected even when vim9 is prepended.

• Ranges to Ex commands should be prefixed with a colon. For example, :vim9 :%s/foo/bar (notice the : before %s). From :h [range]:

  In Vim9 script a range needs to be prefixed with a colon to avoid ambiguity with continuation lines.

• Related to the above, if your keymap's right-hand side (rhs) starts with a range, it may throw an error. To avoid this, use :h <Cmd> or ensure the {rhs} of your keymap begins with silent or :. For example, nnoremap your_key :% !your_cmd<cr> throws an error, while nnoremap your_key <cmd>% !your_cmd<cr>, nnoremap your_key :silent % !your_cmd<cr> and nnoremap your_key ::% !your_cmd<cr> are OK.

• Colorschemes may not load if they are written in legacy script. :vim9 colorscheme foo will not work unless foo is written in vim9script.

• If you have defined a custom command with a completion function (command -complete=custom,Foo() ...), be aware that this function may not work as expected if it is designed to complete the n-th word. This is because there are now n+1 words, including the word vim9. You many need to adapt this function.

• If you work with multi-byte UTF-8 characters, you'll appreciate the vim9 command line. When slicing a UTF-8 string using the [from : to] operator, vim9 is more predictable because it uses character-based addressing, unlike the byte-based addressing of the legacy script.

• Legacy mode of addressing autoloaded functions and variables still work, even without legacy keywords like call and let. For instance, both :vim9 g:foo#bar#baz() and :vim9 call g:foo#bar#baz() work.

You can keep the command line in vim9script mode by default and switch back to the legacy script at any time using the :ToggleVim9Cmdline command.

Other Plugins to Enhance Your Workflow

1. vimcomplete - enhances autocompletion in Vim.

2. devdocs.vim - browse documentation from devdocs.io.

3. scope.vim - fuzzy find anything.

4. VimSuggest - autocompletion for Vim's command-line.