Description
Increase the speed and amount of vim knowledge at your fingertips with precise searching of vim's items: keys (keybindings), options and commands. vimdb is aware of vim's default items, ones in your vimrc and ones in plugins. vimdb's plugin detection works only if you're using a pathogen-like setup i.e. each plugin has its own directory under ~/.vim/bundle/ (see Configuration below to change the directory). Tested with vim >= 7.2 on mac and windows. Works only on ruby 1.9.x.
Install
$ gem install vimdb
Usage
Basic examples searching different vim items:
# List keys with Ctrl
$ vimdb keys C-
+---------------+------+---------------------+------------------------------------------
| key | mode | from | desc |
+---------------+------+---------------------+-----------------------------------------|
| 0 C-d | i | default | delete all indent in the current line |
| <C-End> | i | default | cursor past end of fil |
| <C-End> | n | default | 1 same as "G" |
| <C-Home> | i | default | cursor to start of file |
| <C-Home> | n | default | 1 same as "gg" |
| <C-Left> | n | default | 1 same as "b" |
...
262 rows in set
# List options that contain word 'window' in any field
$ vimdb options window -a
+----------------+--------+----------------------------------------------------+
| name | alias | desc |
+----------------+--------+----------------------------------------------------+
| autochdir | acd | change directory to the file in the current window |
| bufhidden | bh | what to do when buffer is no longer in window |
| cedit | | key used to open the command-line window |
| cmdwinheight | cwh | height of the command-line window |
| cscopequickfix | csqf | use quickfix window for cscope results |
| cursorbind | crb | move cursor in window as it moves in other windows |
| diff | | use diff mode for the current window |
| equalalways | ea | windows are automatically made the same size |
| guiheadroom | ghr | GUI: pixels room for window decorations |
| helpheight | hh | minimum height of a new help window |
| icon | | let Vim set the text of the window icon |
...
30 rows in set
# Search for commands from pathogen plugin
$ vimdb commands pathogen -f=from
+----------+-------+---------------------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| name | alias | from | desc |
+----------+-------+---------------------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| Helptags | | pathogen.vim plugin | :call pathogen#helptags() |
| Ve | | pathogen.vim plugin | :execute s:find(<count>,'edit<bang>',<q-args>,0) |
| Vedit | | pathogen.vim plugin | :execute s:find(<count>,'edit<bang>',<q-args>,0) |
| Vopen | | pathogen.vim plugin | :execute s:find(<count>,'edit<bang>',<q-args>,1) |
| Vpedit | | pathogen.vim plugin | :execute s:find(<count>,'pedit',<q-args>,<bang>1) |
| Vread | | pathogen.vim plugin | :execute s:find(<count>,'read',<q-args>,<bang>1) |
| Vsplit | | pathogen.vim plugin | :execute s:find(<count>,'split',<q-args>,<bang>1) |
| Vtabedit | | pathogen.vim plugin | :execute s:find(<count>,'tabedit',<q-args>,<bang>1) |
| Vvsplit | | pathogen.vim plugin | :execute s:find(<count>,'vsplit',<q-args>,<bang>1) |
+----------+-------+---------------------+-----------------------------------------------------+
9 rows in set
# Info about how a vim item is made
$ vimdb info keys
Created using index.txt and :map
# For a list of all commands
$ vimdb
More Usage
As you can see from the last example, vimdb supports options for each command. For a command's listing of options use --help or -h:
$ vimdb keys --help
Usage: vimdb keys [QUERY]
Options:
-a, --all search all fields
-f, --field field to query
-i, --ignore_case
-m, --mode search by mode, multiple modes are ORed
-n, --not return non-matching results
-r, --regexp query is a regexp
-R, --reload reloads items
--reverse_sort
-s, --sort sort by field
-t, --tab print tab-delimited table
Description:
List vim keys
As you can see, keys can be searched by keystroke, mode, description or from (default, user or plugin name). Some examples:
# List keys with Ctrl-A combo
$ vimdb keys C-A
# List keys with Esc key
$ vimdb keys E-
# List keys with Leader
$ vimdb keys L-
# List keys with no Leader - not of last search
$ vimdb keys L- -n
# List insert mode keys
$ vimdb keys -m=i
# List keys I've defined in vimrc
$ vimdb keys user -f=from
# List keys from my plugins
$ vimdb keys plugin -f=from
# List keys from snipmate plugin
$ vimdb keys snipmate -f=from
# List keys that contain completion in description
$ vimdb keys completion -f=desc
Advanced Usage
vimdb can be customized with your own commands thanks to its rc file and command engine, boson. For example, my rc file defines a command that detects conflicts between default keys and plugin keys:
$ vimdb conflict
+-------+------+---------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| key | mode | from | desc/action |
+-------+------+---------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| C-w o | n | default | close all but current window (like |:only|) |
| C-w o | n | zoomwin plugin | <Plug>ZoomWin |
| * | n | default | search forward for the Nth occurrence of the ident under the cursor |
| * | nos | tcomment_vim plugin | :TCommentRight<CR> |
| * | n | default | search forward for the Nth occurrence of the ident under the cursor |
| * | nos | tcomment_vim plugin | :TComment<CR> |
...
If you look at conflict's implementation, you see it's only about a dozen lines. Since vimdb stores vim items as array of hashes, you can use these within commands for whatever purpose.
To illustrate creating a command, let's create one that lists the first given number of vim commands. In your ~/.vimdbrc:
class Vimdb::Runner
desc "Prints first X options"
def first(num)
# Set item type we're retrieving
Vimdb.item('options')
puts Vimdb.user.items.first(num.to_i).map {|e| e[:name] }
end
endTo test drive it:
$ vimdb first 5
aleph
allowrevins
altkeymap
ambiwidth
antialias
Configuration
Configure vimdb with a ~/.vimdbrc (in ruby), which is loaded before every command request. For example, to configure where plugins are stored:
# plugins stored in ~/.vim/plugins
Vimdb.plugins_dir = 'plugins'
For a more thorough example, see my rc file.
Vim Mappings
Since vimdb runs on ruby 1.9.x, there's a good chance you don't have vim compiled against ruby 1.9.x. No worries, use rvm or rbenv to install a 1.9.x version. Then to invoke vimdb within vim, set up a key to pipe out to vimdb using rvm or rbenv:
map <Leader>v :!rbenv exec vimdb
" or for rvm
map <Leader>v :!rvm 1.9.3 vimdbKey Modes
Vim's key modes are represented as single letters
- n: normal
- c: commandline
- i: insert
- o: operation
- v: visual
- s: select
If you're unfamiliar with all these modes read about them in vim with ':h :map-modes'.
The following modes from :map were altered to fit into the above modes:
- ! -> ci
- l -> ci
- x -> v
- v -> vs
How It Works
This gem creates a vimdb database, ~/.vimdb.pstore, by parsing your vim documentation and outputs of vim commands. When an item is first searched it is parsed. Subsequent searches are cached. To reload (and reparse) you database, pass a --reload option to most commands.
Motivation
Wanted to learn faster than :help would let me.
Credits
- mattn for windows support
Contributing
Todo
- Add support for more vim items - variables, functions
- Considering user annotation for vim items