Nvim (1) Linux Manual Page

NAME

nvim – edit text

SYNOPSIS

nvim [options ] [file … ]
nvim [options ] –
nvim [options ] –t tag
nvim [options ] –q [errorfile ]

DESCRIPTION

nvim is a text editor based on Vim. Start nvim followed by any number of options and/or files:

nvim [options] [file ...]

Commands in nvim begin with colon (`:’ ) Type ":help subject" to get help on a specific subject. Use <Tab> and CTRL-D to complete subjects (":help cmdline-completion").

The "quickref" help section is a condensed reference of editor features:

:help quickref

If you are new to Vim/Nvim, start with the 30-minute tutorial:

:Tutor

After installing/updating Nvim, it’s a good idea to run the self-check:

:checkhealth

file …: File(s) to edit. Opens one buffer per file. To switch between buffers, use the :next and :previous commands.
–: Reads text from standard input until EOF then opens a buffer with that text. User input is read from standard error, which should be a terminal.

OPTIONS

-t tag: Finds tag in the tags file, the associated file becomes the current file and the associated command is executed. Cursor is positioned at the tag location in the file. :help tag-commands
-q [errorfile ]: QuickFix mode. Display the first error in errorfile If errorfile is omitted, the value of the ‘errorfile’ option is used (defaults to errors.err ) Further errors can be jumped to with the :cnext command. :help quickfix
–: End of options. Remaining arguments are treated as literal file names, including filenames starting with hyphen (`-‘ )
-e: Ex mode, reading stdin as Ex commands. :help Ex-mode
-E: Ex mode, reading stdin as text. :help Ex-mode
-es: Silent (non-interactive) Ex mode, reading stdin as Ex commands. Useful for scripting because it does NOT start a UI, unlike –e :help silent-mode
-Es Silent (non-interactive) Ex mode, reading stdin as text.: Useful for scripting because it does NOT start a UI, unlike –E :help silent-mode
-d: Diff mode. Show the difference between two to eight files, similar to sdiff(1). :help diff
-R: Read-only mode. Sets the ‘readonly’ option. Implies –n Buffers can still be edited, but cannot be written to disk if already associated with a file. To overwrite a file, add an exclamation mark to the relevant Ex command, such as :w! :help ‘readonly’
-m: Resets the ‘write’ option, to disable file modifications. Writing to a file is disabled, but buffers can still be modified.
-M: Resets the ‘write’ and ‘modifiable’ options, to disable file and buffer modifications.
-b: Binary mode. :help edit-binary
-l: Lisp mode. Sets the ‘lisp’ and ‘showmatch’ options.
-A: Arabic mode. Sets the ‘arabic’ option.
-H: Hebrew mode. Sets the ‘hkmap’ and ‘rightleft’ options.
-V [N [file ] ]: Verbose mode. Prints debug messages. N is the ‘verbose’ level, defaults to 10 If file is specified, append messages to file instead of printing them. :help ‘verbose’
-D: Debug mode for VimL (Vim script). Started when executing the first command from a script. :help debug-mode
-n: Disable the use of swap files. Sets the ‘updatecount’ option to 0 Can be useful for editing files on a slow medium.
-r [file ]: Recovery mode. If file is omitted then list swap files with recovery information. Otherwise the swap file file is used to recover a crashed session. The swap file has the same name as the file it’s associated with, but with `.swp’ appended. :help recovery
-L [file ]: Alias for –r
-u vimrc: Use vimrc instead of the default ~/.config/nvim/init.vim If vimrc is NORC do not load any initialization files (except plugins). If vimrc is NONE loading plugins is also skipped. :help initialization
-i shada: Use shada instead of the default ~/.local/share/nvim/shada/main.shada If shada is NONE do not read or write a ShaDa file. :help shada
–noplugin: Skip loading plugins. Implied by -u NONE
–clean: Mimic a fresh install of Nvim. Skip loading non-builtin plugins and shada (viminfo) file.
-o [N ]: Open N windows stacked horizontally. If N is omitted, open one window for each file. If N is less than the number of file arguments, allocate windows for the first N files and hide the rest.
-O [N ]: Like –o but tile windows vertically.
-p [N ]: Like –o but for tab pages.
+ [linenum ]: For the first file, position the cursor on line linenum If linenum is omitted, position the cursor on the last line of the file. +5 and -c 5 on the command-line are equivalent to :5 inside nvim.
+/ [pattern ]: For the first file, position the cursor on the first occurrence of pattern If pattern is omitted, the most recent search pattern is used (if any). +/foo and -c /foo on the command-line are equivalent to /foo and :/foo inside nvim. :help search-pattern
+,command/ , –c command: Execute command after reading the first file. Up to 10 instances allowed. Qq Cm +foo and -c "foo" are equivalent.
–cmd command: Like –c but execute command before processing any vimrc. Up to 10 instances of these can be used independently from instances of –c
-S [session ]: Source session after the first file argument has been read. Equivalent to -c "source session" session cannot start with a hyphen (`-‘ ) If session is omitted then Session.vim is used, if found. :help session-file
-s scriptin: Read normal mode commands from scriptin The same can be done with the command :source! scriptin If the end of the file is reached before nvim exits, further characters are read from the keyboard.
-w scriptout: Append all typed characters to scriptout Can be used for creating a script to be used with –s or :source!
-W scriptout: Like –w but truncate scriptout
–startuptime file: During startup, append timing messages to file Can be used to diagnose slow startup times.
–api-info: Dump API metadata serialized to msgpack and exit.
–embed: Use standard input and standard output as a msgpack-rpc channel. :help –embed
–headless: Do not start a UI. When supplied with –embed this implies that the embedding application does not intend to (immediately) start a UI. Also useful for "scraping" messages in a pipe. :help –headless
–listen address: Start RPC server on this pipe or TCP socket.
-h , -help: Print usage information and exit.
-v , -version: Print version information and exit.

ENVIRONMENT

NVIM_LOG_FILE: Low-level log file, usually found at ~/.cache/nvim/log. :help $NVIM_LOG_FILE
VIM: Used to locate user files, such as init.vim. System-dependent. :help $VIM
VIMRUNTIME: Used to locate runtime files (documentation, syntax highlighting, etc.).
XDG_CONFIG_HOME: Path to the user-local configuration directory, see Sx FILES . Defaults to ~/.config :help xdg
XDG_DATA_HOME: Like XDG_CONFIG_HOME but used to store data not generally edited by the user, namely swap, backup, and ShaDa files. Defaults to ~/.local/share :help xdg
VIMINIT: Ex commands to be executed at startup. :help VIMINIT
SHELL: Used to initialize the ‘shell’ option, which decides the default shell used by features like :terminal :! , and system()

FILES

~/.config/nvim/init.vim: User-local nvim configuration file.
~/.config/nvim: User-local nvim configuration directory. See also XDG_CONFIG_HOME
$VIM/sysinit.vim: System-global nvim configuration file.
$VIM: System-global nvim runtime directory.

AUTHORS

Nvim was started by An Thiago de Arruda . Most of Vim was written by An -nosplit An Bram Moolenaar . Vim is based on Stevie, worked on by An Tim Thompson , An Tony Andrews , and An G.R. (Fred) Walter . :help credits

nvim (1) Linux Manual Page