sponsor Vim development Vim logo Vim Book Ad

auto-pairs-gentle : Gentle version of Auto Pairs plugin: Insert or delete brackets, parens in pair

 script karma  Rating 16/7, Downloaded by 754  Comments, bugs, improvements  Vim wiki

created by
Dmitry Frank
 
script type
utility
 
description
This plugin is a fork of AutoPairs. ( vimscript #3599 )

AutoPairs is surely great plugin, but, to me, it behaves too aggressively: if
your cursor is on ")" char, and you type ")", cursor ALWAYS jumps over the ")"
instead of inserting new char.

(And, in "fly mode", AutoPairs is even much more "aggressive"...
So if you like "fly mode" of AutoPairs, then you definitely don't need for
auto-pairs-gentle plugin)

Personally I want the plugin to meddle with it as little as possible. Ideal behavior for
me is that plugin should jump only over those chars, pairs for whose were
inserted automatically: sometimes, and not so rarely, I really need to insert
some brace before another brace, and aggressive jumping over all pair chars
annoyed me so much that I had to completely get rid of AutoPairs until I found
the way to improve it.

First of all, I must say that I have written a patch for existing AutoPairs
plugin that just adds new option, and default behavior was not changed at all.
I have sent pull-request to the author
( https://github.com/jiangmiao/auto-pairs/pull/71 ) , but he answered that my
solution "is not current plugin way", and disagreed to merge.

I believe that highly configurable tools are generally good, and so, it worth
to add a new option to an existing tool instead of make a fork, but now, to
make a fork is the only way I'm left with.


So, here's an explanation of the behavior of new plugin AutoPairsGentle.

Consider an example ("|" char indicates cursor position):

I have an existing expression (that I typed some time ago, not just now):

                  (a * b|)

I type:

                   * (

Result:

                  (a * b * (|))

I type:

                  c + d

Result:

                  (a * b * (c + d|))

I type:

                  )

Result:

                  (a * b * (c + d)|)

Note that cursor just jumped over the ")" since it was inserted automatically.
But if I type ")" again, new char ")" will be inserted, instead of jumping
over the last ")"! Because last parens was not typed just now.
But if you type several nested parens, of course cursor will jump over all of them.
And not more.

The same is for any other pair character.

This is how actually modern IDEs editors work (I have checked Eclipse and
NetBeans), and this algorithm is really useful.

If you don't like this behavior, you surely don't need this plugin.

How does it work: actually, applied solution is very simple: plugin remembers
how many pairs were inserted, and jumps only over this count of pair chars. When
user leaves insert mode, pairs count is reset.



NOTE 1: default behavior of AutoPairsGentle is the same as original AutoPairs,
so, to make the algorithm above work, you should define an option in your
vimrc:

let g:AutoPairsUseInsertedCount = 1

NOTE 2: this option is not compatible with "fly mode" ( g:AutoPairsFlyMode ),
but I believe that if you like fly mode, then you definitely do not need for
AutoPairsGentle, because "fly mode" is much more "aggressive" than default
behavior.

 
install details
Install it as usual, and don't forget to set in your vimrc:

let g:AutoPairsUseInsertedCount = 1

to make it gentle.
 

rate this script Life Changing Helpful Unfulfilling 
script versions (upload new version)

Click on the package to download.

package script version date Vim version user release notes
auto-pairs-gentle.zip 1.0 2013-12-23 7.0 Dmitry Frank Initial upload
ip used for rating: 34.228.239.171

If you have questions or remarks about this site, visit the vimonline development pages. Please use this site responsibly.
Questions about Vim should go to the maillist. Help Bram help Uganda.
   
Vim at Github