Fix Vim tagbar plugin

On Macos, using homebrew to install emacs will blat the tagbar plugin in Vim, due to a conflict with ctags versions.

This fixed the problem for me:
brew reinstall ctags-exuberant brew link --overwrite ctags

Vim: apply macro to entire file

Input:

username1
username2
username3

Target Output:

[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]

Vim Commands:

gg0                # move cursor to first char in file
[email protected]   # record actions into macro q, then undo
:%norm! @q              # apply macro q to entire file
:wq                     # save and exit

Vim is not TextMate

When I first discovered Vim I wasted a lot of time trying to bend it backwards into a traditional editor. The below quote sums it up perfectly:

Vim is not TextMate or whatever other editor you have used before. There is no way to transfer all your old habits seamlessly, point blank.

Instead of wasting your time trying to make Vim and your terminal into something that it’s not and can’t be you should learn how to use and customize Vim wisely. All your Cmd+Shift+Ctrl+Alt combos won’t lead you anywhere. Especially in a terminal where Alt is often problematic and Cmd unusable.

Consider using leader(:help leader):

it’s portable on every platform

it’s less prone to conflicts with your OS or terminal emulator

it opens a lot of easy to remember possibilities

— romainl

Adding gobs of plugins instead of learning Vim’s native functionality is another common trap, so I maintain a secondary lightweight Vim config called Ninjarc with minimal plugins to keep me sharp.

Finally, Tim Pope’s philosophy of favouring commands over leader key combos yields a more cohesive configuration. I’m experimenting with Spacemacs-style command mnemonics in my Aetherwolf Vim config. For example, instead of binding Leader+T to open NerdTree, :tn is used (Toggle NerdTree). This allows :tt for Toggle Tagbar and so on – a nice memorable taxonomy rather than a flat multitude of somewhat arbitrary leader combos.

I might eventually move this into Denite menus à la SpaceVim, but for now I’m digging the simplicity of using :ex commands.

vim snippet: fold function

Fold current function:
mb%zf'b

mb – mark b
% – jump to end of block
zf’b – fold back to marker b

neovim: macos tmux and netrw/vinegar clipboard errors

So it looks like MacOS Sierra broke pbcopy/pbpaste for tmux. This manifests as clipboard errors when using netrw/vinegar in neovim under tmux. (Dunno why netrw is writing to the clipboard but anyways).

The solution is to use Homebrew to reinstall a patched version of reattach-to-user-namespace:

brew uninstall reattach-to-user-namespace
brew install reattach-to-user-namespace --with-wrap-pbcopy-and-pbpaste

Although this was annoying, it did lead to running brew cleanup which reclaimed 3.8GB of disk space. Jinkies!

vim: render plantuml

When using the plugin plantuml-syntax, add the following one-liner in .vimrc to render a PNG in the current directory when ‹leader›b is pressed:

autocmd FileType plantuml nnoremap <buffer> <leader>b :!java -jar ~/bin/plantuml.jar -o %:p:h %<cr>

This assumes Linux and that plantuml.jar lives in ~/bin. If working from a Dropbox directory, the image can then easily be viewed in a web browser.