| *helphelp.txt* Nvim | |
| VIM REFERENCE MANUAL by Bram Moolenaar | |
| Help on help files *helphelp* | |
| Type |gO| to see the table of contents. | |
| ============================================================================== | |
| 1. Help commands *online-help* | |
| *help* *<Help>* *:h* *:help* *<F1>* *i_<F1>* *i_<Help>* | |
| <Help> or | |
| :h[elp] Open a window and display the help file in read-only | |
| mode. If there is a help window open already, use | |
| that one. Otherwise, if the current window uses the | |
| full width of the screen or is at least 80 characters | |
| wide, the help window will appear just above the | |
| current window. Otherwise the new window is put at | |
| the very top. | |
| The 'helplang' option is used to select a language, if | |
| the main help file is available in several languages. | |
| Type |gO| to see the table of contents. | |
| *{subject}* *E149* *E661* | |
| :h[elp] {subject} Like ":help", additionally jump to the tag {subject}. | |
| For example: > | |
| :help options | |
| < {subject} can include wildcards such as "*", "?" and | |
| "[a-z]": | |
| :help z? jump to help for any "z" command | |
| :help z. jump to the help for "z." | |
| But when a tag exists it is taken literally: | |
| :help :? jump to help for ":?" | |
| If there is no full match for the pattern, or there | |
| are several matches, the "best" match will be used. | |
| A sophisticated algorithm is used to decide which | |
| match is better than another one. These items are | |
| considered in the computation: | |
| - A match with same case is much better than a match | |
| with different case. | |
| - A match that starts after a non-alphanumeric | |
| character is better than a match in the middle of a | |
| word. | |
| - A match at or near the beginning of the tag is | |
| better than a match further on. | |
| - The more alphanumeric characters match, the better. | |
| - The shorter the length of the match, the better. | |
| The 'helplang' option is used to select a language, if | |
| the {subject} is available in several languages. | |
| To find a tag in a specific language, append "@ab", | |
| where "ab" is the two-letter language code. See | |
| |help-translated|. | |
| Note that the longer the {subject} you give, the less | |
| matches will be found. You can get an idea how this | |
| all works by using commandline completion (type CTRL-D | |
| after ":help subject" |c_CTRL-D|). | |
| If there are several matches, you can have them listed | |
| by hitting CTRL-D. Example: > | |
| :help cont<Ctrl-D> | |
| < Instead of typing ":help CTRL-V" to search for help | |
| for CTRL-V you can type: > | |
| :help ^V | |
| < This also works together with other characters, for | |
| example to find help for CTRL-V in Insert mode: > | |
| :help i^V | |
| < | |
| It is also possible to first do ":help" and then | |
| use ":tag {pattern}" in the help window. The | |
| ":tnext" command can then be used to jump to other | |
| matches, "tselect" to list matches and choose one. > | |
| :help index | |
| :tselect /.*mode | |
| < When there is no argument you will see matches for | |
| "help", to avoid listing all possible matches (that | |
| would be very slow). | |
| The number of matches displayed is limited to 300. | |
| The `:help` command can be followed by '|' and another | |
| command, but you don't need to escape the '|' inside a | |
| help command. So these both work: > | |
| :help | | |
| :help k| only | |
| < Note that a space before the '|' is seen as part of | |
| the ":help" argument. | |
| You can also use <NL> or <CR> to separate the help | |
| command from a following command. You need to type | |
| CTRL-V first to insert the <NL> or <CR>. Example: > | |
| :help so<C-V><CR>only | |
| < | |
| :h[elp]! [subject] Like ":help", but in non-English help files prefer to | |
| find a tag in a file with the same language as the | |
| current file. See |help-translated|. | |
| *:helpc* *:helpclose* | |
| :helpc[lose] Close one help window, if there is one. | |
| Vim will try to restore the window layout (including | |
| cursor position) to the same layout it was before | |
| opening the help window initially. This might cause | |
| triggering several autocommands. | |
| *:helpg* *:helpgrep* | |
| :helpg[rep] {pattern}[@xx] | |
| Search all help text files and make a list of lines | |
| in which {pattern} matches. Jumps to the first match. | |
| The optional [@xx] specifies that only matches in the | |
| "xx" language are to be found. | |
| You can navigate through the matches with the | |
| |quickfix| commands, e.g., |:cnext| to jump to the | |
| next one. Or use |:cwindow| to get the list of | |
| matches in the quickfix window. | |
| {pattern} is used as a Vim regexp |pattern|. | |
| 'ignorecase' is not used, add "\c" to ignore case. | |
| Example for case sensitive search: > | |
| :helpgrep Uganda | |
| < Example for case ignoring search: > | |
| :helpgrep uganda\c | |
| < Example for searching in French help: > | |
| :helpgrep backspace@fr | |
| < The pattern does not support line breaks, it must | |
| match within one line. You can use |:grep| instead, | |
| but then you need to get the list of help files in a | |
| complicated way. | |
| Cannot be followed by another command, everything is | |
| used as part of the pattern. But you can use | |
| |:execute| when needed. | |
| Compressed help files will not be searched (Fedora | |
| compresses the help files). | |
| *:lh* *:lhelpgrep* | |
| :lh[elpgrep] {pattern}[@xx] | |
| Same as ":helpgrep", except the location list is used | |
| instead of the quickfix list. If the help window is | |
| already opened, then the location list for that window | |
| is used. Otherwise, a new help window is opened and | |
| the location list for that window is set. The | |
| location list for the current window is not changed | |
| then. | |
| *:exu* *:exusage* | |
| :exu[sage] Show help on Ex commands. Added to simulate the Nvi | |
| command. | |
| *:viu* *:viusage* | |
| :viu[sage] Show help on Normal mode commands. Added to simulate | |
| the Nvi command. | |
| When no argument is given to |:help| the file given with the 'helpfile' option | |
| will be opened. Otherwise the specified tag is searched for in all "doc/tags" | |
| files in the directories specified in the 'runtimepath' option. | |
| If you would like to open the help in the current window, see this tip: | |
| |help-curwin|. | |
| The initial height of the help window can be set with the 'helpheight' option | |
| (default 20). | |
| *help-buffer-options* | |
| When the help buffer is created, several local options are set to make sure | |
| the help text is displayed as it was intended: | |
| 'iskeyword' nearly all ASCII chars except ' ', "*", '"' and '|' | |
| 'foldmethod' "manual" | |
| 'tabstop' 8 | |
| 'arabic' off | |
| 'binary' off | |
| 'buflisted' off | |
| 'cursorbind' off | |
| 'diff' off | |
| 'foldenable' off | |
| 'list' off | |
| 'modifiable' off | |
| 'number' off | |
| 'relativenumber' off | |
| 'rightleft' off | |
| 'scrollbind' off | |
| 'spell' off | |
| Jump to specific subjects by using tags. This can be done in two ways: | |
| - Use the "CTRL-]" command while standing on the name of a command or option. | |
| This only works when the tag is a keyword. "<C-Leftmouse>" and | |
| "g<LeftMouse>" work just like "CTRL-]". | |
| - use the ":ta {subject}" command. This also works with non-keyword | |
| characters. | |
| Use CTRL-T or CTRL-O to jump back. | |
| Use ":q" to close the help window. | |
| Use `g==` to execute the current Lua/Vimscript code block. | |
| If there are several matches for an item you are looking for, this is how you | |
| can jump to each one of them: | |
| 1. Open a help window | |
| 2. Use the ":tag" command with a slash prepended to the tag. E.g.: > | |
| :tag /min | |
| 3. Use ":tnext" to jump to the next matching tag. | |
| It is possible to add help files for plugins and other items. You don't need | |
| to change the distributed help files for that. See |add-local-help|. | |
| To write a local help file, see |write-local-help|. | |
| Note that the title lines from the local help files are automagically added to | |
| the "LOCAL ADDITIONS" section in the "help.txt" help file |local-additions|. | |
| This is done when viewing the file in Vim, the file itself is not changed. It | |
| is done by going through all help files and obtaining the first line of each | |
| file. The files in $VIMRUNTIME/doc are skipped. | |
| *:helpt* *:helptags* | |
| *E150* *E151* *E152* *E153* *E154* *E670* *E856* | |
| :helpt[ags] [++t] {dir} | |
| Generate the help tags file(s) for directory {dir}. | |
| When {dir} is ALL then all "doc" directories in | |
| 'runtimepath' will be used. | |
| All "*.txt" and "*.??x" files in the directory and | |
| sub-directories are scanned for a help tag definition | |
| in between stars. The "*.??x" files are for | |
| translated docs, they generate the "tags-??" file, see | |
| |help-translated|. The generated tags files are | |
| sorted. | |
| When there are duplicates an error message is given. | |
| An existing tags file is silently overwritten. | |
| The optional "++t" argument forces adding the | |
| "help-tags" tag. This is also done when the {dir} is | |
| equal to $VIMRUNTIME/doc. | |
| To rebuild the help tags in the runtime directory | |
| (requires write permission there): > | |
| :helptags $VIMRUNTIME/doc | |
| < | |
| ============================================================================== | |
| 2. Translated help files *help-translated* | |
| It is possible to add translated help files, next to the original English help | |
| files. Vim will search for all help in "doc" directories in 'runtimepath'. | |
| At this moment translations are available for: | |
| Chinese - multiple authors | |
| French - translated by David Blanchet | |
| Italian - translated by Antonio Colombo | |
| Japanese - multiple authors | |
| Polish - translated by Mikolaj Machowski | |
| Russian - translated by Vassily Ragosin | |
| See the Vim website to find them: https://www.vim.org/translations.php | |
| A set of translated help files consists of these files: | |
| help.abx | |
| howto.abx | |
| ... | |
| tags-ab | |
| "ab" is the two-letter language code. Thus for Italian the names are: | |
| help.itx | |
| howto.itx | |
| ... | |
| tags-it | |
| The 'helplang' option can be set to the preferred language(s). The default is | |
| set according to the environment. Vim will first try to find a matching tag | |
| in the preferred language(s). English is used when it cannot be found. | |
| To find a tag in a specific language, append "@ab" to a tag, where "ab" is the | |
| two-letter language code. Example: > | |
| :he user-manual@it | |
| :he user-manual@en | |
| The first one finds the Italian user manual, even when 'helplang' is empty. | |
| The second one finds the English user manual, even when 'helplang' is set to | |
| "it". | |
| When using command-line completion for the ":help" command, the "@en" | |
| extension is only shown when a tag exists for multiple languages. When the | |
| tag only exists for English "@en" is omitted. When the first candidate has an | |
| "@ab" extension and it matches the first language in 'helplang' "@ab" is also | |
| omitted. | |
| When using |CTRL-]| or ":help!" in a non-English help file Vim will try to | |
| find the tag in the same language. If not found then 'helplang' will be used | |
| to select a language. | |
| Help files must use latin1 or utf-8 encoding. Vim assumes the encoding is | |
| utf-8 when finding non-ASCII characters in the first line. Thus you must | |
| translate the header with "For Vim version". | |
| The same encoding must be used for the help files of one language in one | |
| directory. You can use a different encoding for different languages and use | |
| a different encoding for help files of the same language but in a different | |
| directory. | |
| Hints for translators: | |
| - Do not translate the tags. This makes it possible to use 'helplang' to | |
| specify the preferred language. You may add new tags in your language. | |
| - When you do not translate a part of a file, add tags to the English version, | |
| using the "tag@en" notation. | |
| - Make a package with all the files and the tags file available for download. | |
| Users can drop it in one of the "doc" directories and start use it. | |
| Report to the development team, so they can add a link on www.vim.org. | |
| - Use the |:helptags| command to generate the tags files. It will find all | |
| languages in the specified directory. | |
| ============================================================================== | |
| 3. Writing help files *help-writing* | |
| For ease of use, a Vim help file for a plugin should follow the format of the | |
| standard Vim help files, except for the first line. If you are writing a new | |
| help file it's best to copy one of the existing files and use it as a | |
| template. | |
| The first line in a help file should have the following format: > | |
| *plugin_name.txt* {short description of the plugin} | |
| The first field is a help tag where ":help plugin_name" will jump to. The | |
| remainder of the line, after a Tab, describes the plugin purpose in a short | |
| way. This will show up in the "LOCAL ADDITIONS" section of the main help | |
| file. Check there that it shows up properly: |local-additions|. | |
| If you want to add a version number or last modification date, put it in the | |
| second line, right aligned. | |
| At the bottom of the help file, place a Vim modeline to set the 'textwidth' | |
| and 'tabstop' options and the 'filetype' to "help". Never set a global option | |
| in such a modeline, that can have undesired consequences. | |
| TAGS | |
| To define a help tag, place the name between asterisks (*tag-name*). The | |
| tag-name should be different from all the Vim help tag names and ideally | |
| should begin with the name of the Vim plugin. The tag name is usually right | |
| aligned on a line. | |
| When referring to an existing help tag and to create a hot-link, place the | |
| name between two bars ("|") eg. |help-writing|. | |
| When referring to a Vim command and to create a hot-link, place the | |
| name between two backticks, eg. inside `:filetype`. You will see this is | |
| highlighted as a command, like a code block (see below). | |
| When referring to a Vim option in the help file, place the option name between | |
| two single quotes, eg. 'statusline' | |
| When referring to any other technical term, such as a filename or function | |
| parameter, surround it in backticks, eg. `~/.path/to/init.vim`. | |
| HIGHLIGHTING | |
| To define a column heading, use a tilde character at the end of the line, | |
| preceded by a space. This will highlight the column heading in a different | |
| color. E.g. | |
| Column heading ~ | |
| To separate sections in a help file, place a series of '=' characters in a | |
| line starting from the first column. The section separator line is highlighted | |
| differently. | |
| *help-codeblock* | |
| To quote a block of ex-commands verbatim, place a greater than (>) character | |
| at the end of the line before the block and a less than (<) character as the | |
| first non-blank on a line following the block. Any line starting in column 1 | |
| also implicitly stops the block of ex-commands before it. E.g. > | |
| function Example_Func() | |
| echo "Example" | |
| endfunction | |
| < | |
| To enable syntax highlighting for a block of code, place a language name | |
| annotation (e.g. "vim") after a greater than (>) character. E.g. >vim | |
| function Example_Func() | |
| echo "Example" | |
| endfunction | |
| < | |
| *help-notation* | |
| The following are highlighted differently in a Vim help file: | |
| - a special key name expressed either in <> notation as in <PageDown>, or | |
| as a Ctrl character as in CTRL-X | |
| - anything between {braces}, e.g. {lhs} and {rhs} | |
| The word "Note", "Notes" and similar automagically receive distinctive | |
| highlighting. So do these: | |
| Todo something to do | |
| Error something wrong | |
| You can find the details in $VIMRUNTIME/syntax/help.vim | |
| vim:tw=78:ts=8:noet:ft=help:norl: | |