NVIM(1) User Commands NVIM(1)

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

-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 Vimscript debug mode. 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/state/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 Start Nvim with "factory defaults" (no user config and
plugins, no shada). :help --clean

-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. "+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.

-l script [args]
Execute Lua script with optional [args] after processing
any preceding Nvim startup arguments. All [args] are
treated as script arguments and are passed literally to
Lua, that is, -l stops processing of Nvim arguments. :help
-l

-S [session]
Execute session after the first file argument has been
read. If session filename ends with .lua it is executed as
Lua instead of Vimscript. 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_APPNAME
The name of sub-directories used within each XDG user
directory. Defaults to nvim. :help $NVIM_APPNAME

NVIM_LOG_FILE
Low-level log file, usually found at
~/.local/state/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 FILES.
Defaults to ~/.config. :help xdg

XDG_STATE_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/state. :help xdg

XDG_DATA_HOME
Like XDG_CONFIG_HOME, but used to store data not generally
edited by the user, things like runtime 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 Thiago de Arruda. Most of Vim was written by Bram
Moolenaar. Vim is based on Stevie, worked on by Tim Thompson, Tony
Andrews, and G.R. (Fred) Walter. :help credits

illumos December 17, 2017 illumos