Setting up Vim for Python

Question

I really like the Emacs editor for Python because of its smart tabbing for instance if I have something like this

def foo():
    if bar:
         blah
         [b]eep

and I press tab on the cursor (which is on the b of beep), it will not insert a new tab causing a syntax error but it would toggle through the possible levels that beep can be on. Is there any way of getting this effect on Vim?

Sabito · Accepted Answer · 2021-05-19 07:55:23Z

93

In general, vim is a very powerful regular language editor (macros extend this but we'll ignore that for now). This is because vim's a thin layer on top of ed, and ed isn't much more than a line editor that speaks regex. Emacs has the advantage of being built on top of ELisp; lending it the ability to easily parse complex grammars and perform indentation tricks like the one you shared above.

To be honest, I've never been able to dive into the depths of emacs because it is simply delightful meditating within my vim cave. With that said, let's jump in.

Getting Started

Janus

For beginners, I highly recommend installing the readymade Janus plugin (fwiw, the name hails from a Star Trek episode featuring Janus Vim). If you want a quick shortcut to a vim IDE it's your best bang for your buck.

I've never used it much, but I've seen others use it happily and my current setup is borrowed heavily from an old Janus build.

Vim Pathogen

Otherwise, do some exploring on your own! I'd highly recommend installing vim pathogen if you want to see the universe of vim plugins.

It's a package manager of sorts. Once you install it, you can git clone packages to your ~/.vim/bundle directory and they're auto-installed. No more plugin installation, maintenance, or uninstall headaches!

You can run the following script from the GitHub page to install pathogen:

mkdir -p ~/.vim/autoload ~/.vim/bundle; \
curl -so ~/.vim/autoload/pathogen.vim \
    https://raw.github.com/tpope/vim-pathogen/HEAD/autoload/pathogen.vim

Helpful Links

Here are some links on extending vim I've found and enjoyed:

Turning Vim Into A Modern Python IDE
Vim As Python IDE
OS X And Python (osx specific)
Learn Vimscript The Hard Way (great book if you want to learn vimscript)

edited May 19, 2021 at 7:55

Sabito

5,23010 gold badges39 silver badges66 bronze badges

answered Feb 7, 2012 at 9:16

mvanveen

10.1k8 gold badges35 silver badges42 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

5 Comments

Walter Over a year ago

The first link is the de facto "Vim as Python IDE" guide and the best one I've seen to date.

Bodhi Over a year ago

the first link really is in-depth and full of goodies for python and vim. Thanks!

Makis Over a year ago

I disagree about Janus. I did this but it was more hassle than worth. It installs far more than you need and thus you never really learn it. And if you don't work on a Mac you need to fix things in it anyways (some commands use the Mac apple key).

Iqbal Over a year ago

First link is broken.

Ashish Over a year ago

For those looking for the first link: web.archive.org/web/20151210012212/http://www.sontek.net/blog/…

Sean1708 · Accepted Answer · 2014-03-13 11:37:24Z

26

For those arriving around summer 2013, I believe some of this thread is outdated.

I followed this howto which recommends Vundle over Pathogen. After one days use I found installing plugins trivial.

The klen/python-mode plugin deserves special mention. It provides pyflakes and pylint amongst other features.

I have just started using Valloric/YouCompleteMe and I love it. It has C-lang auto-complete and python also works great thanks to jedi integration. It may well replace jedi-vim as per this discussion /davidhalter/jedi-vim/issues/119

Finally browsing the /carlhuda/janus plugins supplied is a good guide to useful scripts you might not know you are looking for such as NerdTree, vim-fugitive, syntastic, powerline, ack.vim, snipmate...

All the above '{}/{}' are found on github you can find them easily with Google.

edited Mar 13, 2014 at 11:37

Sean1708

4532 silver badges13 bronze badges

answered Jul 6, 2013 at 9:43

Greg

2,09420 silver badges11 bronze badges

1 Comment

Dzamo Norton Over a year ago

In 2017, I find that VIM 8's native package management is enough for me.

Kimvais · Accepted Answer · 2012-02-07 08:10:55Z

16

Put the following in your .vimrc

autocmd BufRead *.py set smartindent cinwords=if,elif,else,for,while,try,except,finally,def,class
autocmd BufRead *.py set nocindent
autocmd BufWritePre *.py normal m`:%s/\s\+$//e ``
filetype plugin indent on

2 Comments

Harry Moreno Over a year ago

The detailed instructions make no mention of the lines you suggested. I also had to add autocmd BufRead *.py set shiftwidth=4 in order to get 4 space indentation when pressing enter

Harry Moreno Over a year ago

and autocmd BufRead *.py set ts=4 lets you delete in 4 space increments

orluke · Accepted Answer · 2012-06-20 15:28:30Z

3

There is a bundled collection of Vim plugins for Python development: http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=3770

answered Jun 20, 2012 at 15:28

orluke

2,0611 gold badge17 silver badges15 bronze badges

Comments

Scott Emmons · Accepted Answer · 2015-01-09 19:24:14Z

2

Under Linux, What worked for me was John Anderson's (sontek) guide, which you can find at this link. However, I cheated and just used his easy configuration setup from his Git repostiory:

git clone -b vim https://github.com/sontek/dotfiles.git

cd dotfiles

./install.sh vim

His configuration is fairly up to date as of today.

edited Jan 9, 2015 at 19:24

Scott Emmons

1,8913 gold badges13 silver badges9 bronze badges

answered Oct 21, 2013 at 2:02

Will Sams

3164 silver badges14 bronze badges

1 Comment

Will Sams Over a year ago

I should modify this answer: you need to clone the vim branch as Sontek decided to go emacs on us. 'git clone -b vim github.com/sontek/dotfiles.git'. If you mistakenly clone the master branch, do './install.sh restore', restart your machine and then all will be well.

Tomas Tomecek · Accepted Answer · 2015-02-19 07:48:43Z

2

Some time ago I installed Valloric/YouCompleteMe and I find it really awesome. It provides you completion for file paths, function names, methods, variable names... Together with davidhalter/jedi-vim it makes vim great for python programming (the only thing missing now is a linter).

answered Feb 19, 2015 at 7:48

Tomas Tomecek

6,5543 gold badges33 silver badges27 bronze badges

Comments

Victoria Stuart · Accepted Answer · 2017-09-09 01:55:31Z

2

Re: the dead "Turning Vim Into A Modern Python IDE" link, back in 2013 I saved a copy, that I converted to a HTML page as well as a PDF copy:

http://persagen.com/files/misc/Turning_vim_into_a_modern_Python_IDE.html

http://persagen.com/files/misc/Turning_vim_into_a_modern_Python_IDE.pdf

Edit (Sep 08, 2017) updated URLs.

edited Sep 9, 2017 at 1:55

answered Jan 6, 2017 at 20:30

Victoria Stuart

5,1822 gold badges48 silver badges43 bronze badges

1 Comment

Victoria Stuart Over a year ago

@Baron: thank you for that notification; I've reposted those files on my website, Persagen.com.

Oseack · Accepted Answer · 2012-11-02 01:50:52Z

0

A very good plugin management system to use. The included vimrc file is good enough for python programming and can be easily configured to your needs. See http://spf13.com/project/spf13-vim/

answered Nov 2, 2012 at 1:50

Oseack

1912 silver badges5 bronze badges

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Setting up Vim for Python

8 Answers 8

Getting Started

Helpful Links

5 Comments

1 Comment

2 Comments

Comments

1 Comment

Comments

1 Comment

Comments

Your Answer

Linked

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

8 Answers 8

Getting Started

Helpful Links

5 Comments

1 Comment

2 Comments

Comments

1 Comment

Comments

1 Comment

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Linked

Related