vim autoindent stop from removing indents - vim

I try to use vim with its autoindent feature which works reasonably well. But I find it very annoying that in some situation it removes indents as well because it produces additional work. For example when I have a single indented line, I go to the end of the line and type then vim removes the indent of the line. How can I turn of the removal of existing indents?

Did you tried:
:set noautoindent
:set noai #same as above
Or try to do with smart indent
:set nosmartindent
:set nosi #same

Related

Vim autoindent indents incorrectly

When writing code in vim, I've noticed that it sometimes messes up the indentation of the current line after pressing return. (In the gif, I go into insert mode, with the cursor at the end of the date function. When I press return, the whole "echo date('Y');" part looses its indentation when it should not).
I have a ton of directives in my vimrc to try and stop all kinds of autoindentation, but much to my irritation, the problem persists.
filetype plugin indent off
filetype plugin off
set noautoindent
set nosmartindent
set nocindent
set indentexpr=''
let b:did_indent = 1
set ft?
filetype indent off
I wish there was a way to have vim indent files much like your "more standard" text editors, whereby they don't try to be smart, but just maintain the current indentation of the current line in the new line. Like this:
Is this possible?
set smartindent is only needed on my VIM to get the effect you shown by gedit.
So it seems that this line was causing the first issue displayed in the vim. Its part of the Vundle plugin manager inclusion code:
filetype plugin indent on
Ensuring that my indent rules were after this fixed the problem completely.

Indent lines as I type in vim

I know that gg=G is one of the simplest and easiest commands to indent lines in vim.
But, is there a way to indent lines as I type and press Enter?
Yes. Add the following to your vimrc:
set autoindent
filetype plugin indent on
Autoindent just indents based on the previous line's indentation if it does not know how to indent. Filetype indentation uses some things vim knows about what kind of programming language you are writing in to indent it correctly. Filetype indentation will override autoindentation.

vim: autoindent not working

my autoindent is not working, any diagnostic tests to figure it out?
my ":set" is:
:set
--- Options --- cindent laststatus=2 scroll=17
tabstop=4 window=36
filetype=cpp number
smartindent ttyfast
helplang=en paste
syntax=cpp ttymouse=xterm2
backspace=indent,eol,start
fileencoding=utf-8
fileencodings=ucs-bom,utf-8,default,latin1
printoptions=paper:letter
runtimepath=~/.vim,/var/lib/vim/addons,/usr/share/vim/vimfiles,/usr/share/vim/vim72,/usr/share/vim/vimfiles/af
ter,/var/lib/vim/addons/after,~/.vim/after
suffixes=.bak,~,.swp,.o,.info,.aux,.log,.dvi,.bbl,.blg,.brf,.cb,.ind,.idx,.ilg,.inx,.out,.toc
try:
:set ai
or:
:set autoindent
find more about auto-indent:
:h ai
Otherwise, it's might be something with file type detection.
I had a stale function in indentexpr which persisted after changing the filetype. This eventually fixed it for me:
:set indentexpr=
In case someone else face the same issue, I had a similar issue that none of the above fixed.
What was wrong for me was the tab interpretations. here is the set up that made it work:
set expandtab
set tabstop=2
set shiftwidth=2
set autoindent
set smartindent
And to check when indenting if the indentation was correct, I added the following, still in my vimrc file:
" helper for indent mistake
set list listchars=tab:»·,trail:·
Which display a "»" instead of the regular "·" if my indent is wrong. Very handy.
Hope it helps.
I had the same issue and these settings fixed it.
filetype on
filetype plugin on
filetype indent on
You should probably turn off smartindent and use :filetype indent on and cindent (which seems to be also set) instead.
Here's one way to test out whether you have the configuration correct, then persist your configuration so Vim always operates thusly. This font indicates text which should be typed in literally, except <CR> means press the "Enter" or "Return" key.
Create a new system user, with a new home directory.
Start Vim. All settings should be set however they ship with Vim by default.
Open a file, say, test.txt.
Make sure autoindent is enabled (:set ai?<CR>)
Prove that autoindent doesn't happen:
Type a space or two, then hit enter.
When the cursor advances to the next line, it should return to column 1, the far-left column.
Turn on autoindent (:set ai<CR>)
Make sure autoindent is enabled (:set ai?<CR>)
Prove that autoindent happens:
Type a space or two, then hit enter.
When the cursor advances to the next line, it should still be in the same column.
Persist autoindent with :mkvimrc<CR>.
Hope that helps! Here are some other notes:
These instructions might be specific to left-to-right locales.
Here's my vimrc
"The 'autoindent' option is reset when the 'paste' option is set". So try to remove 'paste' from your settings (vim-options).
:set smartindent? showd: nosmartindent
Then activating it with :set smartindent solved problem for me.
I had the same problem, and I have tried many commands, all failed.
At last, I use the following command, and it works:
autocmd VimEnter * set autoindent
It's not a elegant method, however, it does works.

Why can't I stop vim from wrapping my code?

I can't stop vim from wrapping my Python code. If I enter :set nowrap like a champ, but it still wraps.
I can hit J to unite the split lines of code, so it seems like a real carriage return is being inserted. I just don't understand why or how to stop it.
'textwidth' 'tw' number (default 0)
local to buffer
{not in Vi}
Maximum width of text that is being inserted. A longer line will be
broken after white space to get this width. A zero value disables
this. 'textwidth' is set to 0 when the 'paste' option is set. When
'textwidth' is zero, 'wrapmargin' may be used. See also
'formatoptions' and |ins-textwidth|.
When 'formatexpr' is set it will be used to break the line.
NOTE: This option is set to 0 when 'compatible' is set.
'wrapmargin' 'wm' number (default 0)
local to buffer
Number of characters from the right window border where wrapping
starts. When typing text beyond this limit, an <EOL> will be inserted
and inserting continues on the next line.
Options that add a margin, such as 'number' and 'foldcolumn', cause
the text width to be further reduced. This is Vi compatible.
When 'textwidth' is non-zero, this option is not used.
See also 'formatoptions' and |ins-textwidth|. {Vi: works differently
and less usefully}
If you refer to auto wrapping of long lines sending them to the next one, try
:set textwidth=0
:set wrapmargin=0
None of the other answers worked for me (IDK why).
:set wrap! Did the trick for me (using GVim for Windows).
set formatoptions-=t should do the trick. set formatoptions+=t will turn auto-wrapping back on.
For more information on what you can do with formatoptions, see the docs.
For preventing vim from wrapping long lines I use these two lines in my .vimrc:
set nowrap " do not automatically wrap on load
set formatoptions-=t " do not automatically wrap text when typing
To disable line wrap, you can enter
:set wrap! or append this command to your ~/.vimrc.
Maybe it's the textwidth that's set, which automatically breaks lines when it reaches a certain length
Try
:set tw=0
If that fails play with e.g.
:set wrap linebreak textwidth=0
and
:set virtualedit=insert
Vim may have to be in vi-compatible mode.
Open vimrc_example.vim (Yes, this is the file in Vim74) and set textwidth=0.
On macbook pro I outcommented in .vimrc the line
autocmd FileType text setlocal textwidth=78
so it became
" autocmd FileType text setlocal textwidth=78
.
(I installed a version of vim via homebrew.)
This helped for all .txt files.

Tab key == 4 spaces and auto-indent after curly braces in Vim

How do I make vi-Vim never use tabs (converting spaces to tabs, bad!), makes the tab key == 4 spaces, and automatically indent code after curly brace blocks like Emacs does?
Also, how do I save these settings so I never have to input them again?
I've seen other questions related to this, but it always seems to be a little off from what I want.
As has been pointed out in a couple of other answers, the preferred method now is NOT to use smartindent, but instead use the following (in your .vimrc):
filetype plugin indent on
" show existing tab with 4 spaces width
set tabstop=4
" when indenting with '>', use 4 spaces width
set shiftwidth=4
" On pressing tab, insert 4 spaces
set expandtab
In your [.vimrc:][1] file:
set smartindent
set tabstop=4
set shiftwidth=4
set expandtab
The help files take a bit of time to get used to, but the more you read, the better Vim gets:
:help smartindent
Even better, you can embed these settings in your source for portability:
:help auto-setting
To see your current settings:
:set all
As graywh points out in the comments, smartindent has been replaced by cindent which "Works more cleverly", although still mainly for languages with C-like syntax:
:help C-indenting
Related, if you open a file that uses both tabs and spaces, assuming you've got
set expandtab ts=4 sw=4 ai
You can replace all the tabs with spaces in the entire file with
:%retab
The best way to get filetype-specific indentation is to use filetype plugin indent on in your vimrc. Then you can specify things like set sw=4 sts=4 et in .vim/ftplugin/c.vim, for example, without having to make those global for all files being edited and other non-C type syntaxes will get indented correctly, too (even lisps).
To have 4-space tabs in most files, real 8-wide tab char in Makefiles, and automatic indenting in various files including C/C++, put this in your ~/.vimrc file:
" Only do this part when compiled with support for autocommands.
if has("autocmd")
" Use filetype detection and file-based automatic indenting.
filetype plugin indent on
" Use actual tab chars in Makefiles.
autocmd FileType make set tabstop=8 shiftwidth=8 softtabstop=0 noexpandtab
endif
" For everything else, use a tab width of 4 space chars.
set tabstop=4 " The width of a TAB is set to 4.
" Still it is a \t. It is just that
" Vim will interpret it to be having
" a width of 4.
set shiftwidth=4 " Indents will have a width of 4.
set softtabstop=4 " Sets the number of columns for a TAB.
set expandtab " Expand TABs to spaces.
On many Linux systems, like Ubuntu, the .vimrc file doesn't exist by default, so it is recommended that you create it first.
Don't use the .viminfo file that exist in the home directory. It is used for a different purpose.
Step 1: Go to your home directory
cd ~
Step 2: Create the file
vim .vimrc
Step 3: Add the configuration stated above
filetype plugin indent on
set tabstop=4
set shiftwidth=4
set expandtab
Step 3: Save file, by pressing Shift + ZZ.
The recommended way is to use filetype based indentation and only use smartindent and cindent if that doesn't suffice.
Add the following to your .vimrc
set expandtab
set shiftwidth=2
set softtabstop=2
filetype plugin indent on
Hope it helps as being a different answer.
From the VIM wiki:
:set tabstop=4
:set shiftwidth=4
:set expandtab
edit your ~/.vimrc
$ vim ~/.vimrc
add following lines :
set tabstop=4
set shiftwidth=4
set softtabstop=4
set expandtab
The auto-indent is based on the current syntax mode. I know that if you are editing Foo.java, then entering a { and hitting Enter indents the following line.
As for tabs, there are two settings. Within Vim, type a colon and then "set tabstop=4" which will set the tabs to display as four spaces. Hit colon again and type "set expandtab" which will insert spaces for tabs.
You can put these settings in a .vimrc (or _vimrc on Windows) in your home directory, so you only have to type them once.
Firstly, do not use the Tab key in Vim for manual indentation. Vim has a pair of commands in insert mode for manually increasing or decreasing the indentation amount. Those commands are Ctrl-T and Ctrl-D. These commands observe the values of tabstop, shiftwidth and expandtab, and maintain the correct mixture of spaces and tabs (maximum number of tabs followed by any necessary number of spaces).
Secondly, these manual indenting keys don't have to be used very much anyway if you use automatic indentation.
If Ctrl-T instead of Tab bothers you, you can remap it:
:imap <Tab> ^T
You can also remap Shift-Tab to do the Ctrl-D deindent:
:imap <S-Tab> ^D
Here ^T and ^D are literal control characters that can be inserted as Ctrl-VCtrl-T.
With this mapping in place, you can still type literal Tab into the buffer using Ctrl-VTab. Note that if you do this, even if :set expandtab is on, you get an unexpanded tab character.
A similar effect to the <Tab> map is achieved using :set smarttab, which also causes backspace at the front of a line to behave smart.
In smarttab mode, when Tab is used not at the start of a line, it has no special meaning. That's different from my above mapping of Tab to Ctrl-T, because a Ctrl-T used anywhere in a line (in insert mode) will increase that line's indentation.
Other useful mappings may be:
:map <Tab> >
:map <S-Tab> <
Now we can do things like select some lines, and hit Tab to indent them over. Or hit Tab twice on a line (in command mode) to increase its indentation.
If you use the proper indentation management commands, then everything is controlled by the three parameters: shiftwidth, tabstop and expandtab.
The shiftwidth parameter controls your indentation size; if you want four space indents, use :set shiftwidth=4, or the abbreviation :set sw=4.
If only this is done, then indentation will be created using a mixture of spaces and tabs, because noexpandtab is the default. Use :set expandtab. This causes tab characters which you type into the buffer to expand into spaces, and for Vim-managed indentation to use only spaces.
When expandtab is on, and if you manage your indentation through all the proper Vim mechanisms, the value of tabstop becomes irrelevant. It controls how tabs appear if they happen to occur in the file. If you have set tabstop=8 expandtab and then sneak a hard tab into the file using Ctrl-VTab, it will produce an alignment to the next 8-column-based tab position, as usual.
Afterall, you could edit the .vimrc,then add the conf
set tabstop=4
Or exec the command
Simplest one will be n vim file
set tabstop=4

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