Calling a function upon set command - vim

I'm swapping some mappings on my keyboard to make it easier on my wrist, but I wouldn't want others to be surprised if they open vim on a computer I had been working on.
So I put these mappings inside a function in my .vimrc so I can selectively enable the mappings.
My question is, how can I tell vim (in the .vimrc file) to call a function if I :set a variable?
Something like :set wrist and it would call SwapKeysForWrist.
Note: I know I can give the function a simpler name and call it, for example :call Shahbaz(), but that requires me to use shift three times (besides :) which is what I'm trying to avoid. In fact, the function swaps the digits with their alternative keys (since I use those symbols much more often than actual numbers during programming), and typing parentheses (added that I'd be holding shift) does strain my wrist.

You cannot define your own :set names, you can only use mappings or custom commands.
I would suggest using a custom :Wrist command; it's short to type and should be easy for you to remember. If you want to get around the uppercase W, you need to use a :cabbrev or the cmdalias plugin.

Related

How do I customize three letter sequences in Vim Latex-Suite?

I installed Latex-Suite for Vim, and I like it very much, but I'd like to be able to customize the environment mappings that came by default, and add new ones. For example I want to edit the equation environment that appears typing EEQ and move around some elements, like the \label{} command. How can I do this? I've been scanning everything inside my /usr/share/vim/vimfiles/ftplugin but I can't find a way to do it (or I just don't understand what those files are).
You want to check out the documentation on Macro Customisation, specifically the Tex_Env_{name} bit.
In short, if you want your theorem snippet to look like
\begin{theorem}
<++>
\end{theorem}<++>
then you want a line like
let g:Tex_Env_theorem = "\\begin{theorem}\<CR><++>\<CR>\\end{theorem}"
in your vimrc.
Note the backslashes to escape carriage-return, and double-backslash for normal backslashes.
The <F5> functionality (press F5 after typing an environment name, i.e. figure<F5>) should work out of the box, but you may need to refresh the three-letter code. This is more hassle than it needs to be, but something like
autocmd BufNewFile,BufRead *.tex call IMAP('EFI', g:Tex_Env_figure,'tex')
will do the job.
The answer to the question you asked comes with a caveat, which is that Latex-Suite is an enormous amount of code that is very hard and annoying to modify, and which does not play nicely with other plugins. This falls into Latex-Suite's philosophy that it's the only plugin you need for editing latex within vim.
That said, you want to look in /path/to/ftplugin/latex-suite/envmacros.vim. Searching for EEQ will lead you on the path to understanding the set of calls that latex-suite performs. I would like to reiterate that many functions are deeply intertwined.
On the other hand, there is a very easy way to have very easily customizable environments, which are snippets. See the UltiSnips page for a good example of how this works. These are designed for customization and extremely easy to write.

vim command-line snippets possible?

Is there any way to define and use snippets on the vim command-line? For example, when I want to select a portion of text I want to replace a string of text within, excluding the rest of the line, I have to change:
:'<,'>
to
:%s\%VsPat/rPat/g
which once in awhile might be alright, but lately I find myself performing this kind of s/S/R/ often enough to make it a PITA; yet still more efficient than making each change in the selection manually.
Actually there are quite a few regular editing command I use in VIM that would increase my efficiency if I could tie them to a snippet somehow. So is there any way to use snippets at vim command-line?
What about just going on with your substitution without changing anything?
:'<,'>s/\%VsPat/rPat/g
Or using a visual mode mapping?
xnoremap <key> :s/\%V/g<left><left>
There is build-in feature cnoreabbrev it is simple replacement, so if you define it for example
:cnoreabbrev ss %s\%VsPat/rPat/g
then when you type :ss and press <space>, it will automatically replace ss with following
:%s\%VsPat/rPat/g
Check it out, it should solve at least half of your problems :-)

how to add vim keymap

While programming I am regulary using the following two lines:
sprintf(buff,"%s", __func__);
putrsUART(buff);
Is it possible to set any keyboard shortcut to insert these two lines?
E.g. when I type \sp in command mode, these functions get added at the cursor position in my file. Is this possible? And if so, how do I map my keys?
Thanks in Advance.
You can use abbreviations, which are designed for this.
:abbr spb sprintf(buff,"%s", __func__);
:abbr uart putrsUART(buff);
Use :help abbr for the gory details. Note that you need to type another character after the abbreviated form for vim to recognize them. This comes naturally for these as you will type ENTER as the next character. It is also possible to enter more than one line with abbreviations. Simply use <CR> where you want a new line.
Here's an easy mapping for normal mode that lets you hit \sp (unless you've remapped leader, in which case use that instead of \) in order to insert the sprintf statement.
map <Leader>sp isprintf(buff,"%s", __func__);<Esc>
That being said I think abbreviations are the way to go here
As already mentioned, abbreviations (which I would limit to insert mode (:iabbr), because you probably won't need them in the command-line) are best for simple expansions; you can also define them only for certain filetypes only (via :iabbr <buffer> ...).
Your __func__ looks like a template parameter that you need to adapt each time. You cannot do this via abbreviations, but there are various plugins (many inspired from functionality in the TextMate editor) that offer template insertion with parameter expansion and several advanced features. Check out one of snipMate, xptemplate, or UltiSnips.
Try snip-Mate for inserting regularly used codesnippets. http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=2540
Wrong answer, Sorry:
Try this in your vimrc:
map <c-w> :sprintf(buff,"%s",func)<cr>
This means mapping to Ctrl-W.

handling special characters when executing named buffers in vim

I've used vi for decades, and am now practicing using vim, expecting
eventually to switch to it entirely.
I have a number of questions, but I'll start with the one that
troubles me most. Something I have long done in vi is to type
a bottom-line command into the file I am editing, yank it to a named buffer
(e.g., using the keystrokes "ayy) and execute that buffer (using
:#a^M). This allows me to edit complicated commands till they
work right, and to keep commands that I will use many times as I
work in a file. (I have
in my .exrc file a mapping that reduces this yank-and-execute to a
single keystroke; but that isn't relevant to my question.)
I find that in vim, I need a lot more ^Vs than in vi. This
means, on the one hand, that when I have some command-line in a file
that I expect to use this way, I now need to keep it in two
versions, one for vi and one for vim. Also, the requirement of the
extra ^Vs seems inelegant: evidently various special characters
that are interpreted once when the named buffer is executed in vi
are interpreted twice when its is executed in vim -- but why?
As an example, a command of the form
map =f :w^V|e foo^M
(mapping the keystroke-sequence =f to write the current file
and go to the file foo) works this way in vi, but has to have the form
map =f :w^V^V|e foo^V^M
in vim. (Here in both commands, ^V is gotten by typing ^V^V,
and ^M is gotten by typing ^V^M; so typing the first version
involves typing three ^Vs, and the second, seven.) To be
exact: the first version does work in vim if one actually
types it into the bottom line (with the indicated extra ^Vs);
but the latter is required in an executed named buffer.
Any explanation? Anything I can set to fix this? ("compatible"
doesn't seem to do it.) Any hope that it will be fixed in a future
release? (The system I am on uses version 7.0.)
(I should confess that I'm not a programmer; just a user who has
become proficient in vi.)
Personally, I'd stop using ^V completely. In Vim (I've no idea about Vi), there are various key notations that get round the problems you're having. For your specific example, I'd recommend:
map =f :w<bar>e foo<CR>
where <bar> means 'insert the vertical bar here' and <CR> means 'insert a carriage return here'. See:
:help key-notation
for more information. I find the <CR> much easier to understand than ^V^M.
That's an interesting way of using :#, which I hadn't thought of before. I generally just use the command line history when I need to edit complicated commands, and I tend to save common or complicated commands as mappings or commands in my .vimrc (of course, I have a mapping that will pop open my .vimrc in a new tab). But there are certainly benefits to using vim's normal mode rather than command line mode for editing a complicated command.
As I understand it, you not only want to avoid so many <C-V> characters, you would also like to be able to use the same commands in vim and vi. Unfortunately, that would preclude you from using the (preferred in vim) key-notation. I think that you should be able to use the cmdline mode's Ctrl-R Ctrl-R register to help you out (:help c_<C-R>_<C-R>). E.g.
map <Leader>e mm^"ay$`m:<C-R><C-R>a<CR>
mm - mark cursor location so we can return later
^"ay$ - yank current line into register a (ignoring whitespace at beginning and newline at end)
``m` - return cursor to start position
: - enter command line mode
<C-R><C-R>a - place the literal contents of register a onto the command line, which seems to be where your problem with vim versus vi was coming to into play. I think that <C-R>a would give you the same behaviour you are seeing now with :#a.
- execute the whole thing
Using that mapping, I then typed your example of map =f :w^V|e foo^M into a file, placed my cursor on that line, ran my <Leader>e mapping, verified that your =f mapping had loaded correctly, and then ran it. Obviously you'll want to customize it to fit your needs, but I think that playing around with <C-R><C-R> will basically get you what you want.
All of that said, if you can, I'd strongly recommend taking the plunge and forgetting about compatibility with vi. Then you can use the much simpler key-notation and a host of other vim features. :-)

Is vim able to detect the natural language of a file, then load the correct dictionary?

I am using several languages, and currently I am obliged to indicate to vim with which of these the spell check must be done. Is there a way to set up vim so that it automatically detects the correct one? I vaguely remember that in a previous version of vim, when the spell check was not integrated, the vimspell script made this possible.
It would be even better if this could apply not only to a file but also to a portion of a file, since I frequently mix several languages in a single file. Of course, I would like to avoid to load several dictionaries simultaneously.
I don't know if there is a way to autodetect it, but if you put vim:spell:spelllang=foo,bar,baz at the bottom of the file, vim will set the spellchecking languages to foo, bar, and baz when the file is opened. Note that you must put at least one space before that text, or vim will think it's part of the file.
Since vim is missing this feature, I found it useful to define shortcuts like these in .vimrc:
command! Nb :set spelllang=nb
command! En :set spelllang=en

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