vim: How to detect stdin input in .vimrc?

Question

How can one detect stdin input in .vimrc?

I have the following command in my ~/.vimrc:

autocmd BufWinEnter * silent loadview

to open a file with a cursor at the last line position. However, if I use vim on stdin, I get the following error message:

Error detected while processing BufWinEnter Autocommands for "*":
E32: No file name
Press ENTER or type command to continue

How can one detect that vim is used on stdin in .vimrc to suppress execution of the command in such cases?

Thank you for your help!

romainl · Accepted Answer · 2021-05-06 14:18:08Z

7

v:argv is a list that begins with the complete path of the program, and contains each argument, if any.

If you call Vim like this:

$ vim

:echo v:argv outputs something like:

['/path/to/vim']

If you call Vim like this:

$ vim foo.txt bar.json

:echo v:argv outputs something like:

['/path/to/vim', 'foo.txt', 'bar.json']

If you call Vim like this:

$ echo 'foo bar baz' | vim -

:echo v:argv outputs something like:

['/path/to/vim', '-']

Therefore, you can condition the execution of :loadview to the content of v:argv[1]. Note that we use get() because the index 1 may not exist:

autocmd BufWinEnter * if get(v:argv, 1, '') != '-' | silent loadview | endif

Reference:

:help :get()
:help v:argv

answered May 6, 2021 at 14:18

romainl

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1 Comment

helmingstay Over a year ago

This seems version-dependent, but a quick glance doesn't show what version/feature-set is required. On Vim ver 8.0.1763 (shared server environment), I do :echo v:argv and I get: Undefined variable: v:argv

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