nvim-light

Lightweight configuration focused on providing "basic features" with little boilerplate. It includes better syntax highlight, a fuzzy finder and IDE-like features powered by Neovim's LSP client.

Requirements

• Neovim v0.8 or greater.
• git.
• A C compiler. Can be gcc, tcc or zig.
• make, the build tool.
• A language server. Required to actually enable the "IDE-like" features.
• (optional) ripgrep. Improves project wide search speed.
• (optional) fd. Improves file search speed.

Note for windows users

If you need a C compiler then zig is the easiest to install. It's available on winget, scoop and chocolatey. You can also find some links in the zig download page.

If you experience performance issues with the plugin Telescope then you might want to try an alternative like fzf.lua.

Installation

• Backup your existing configuration if you have one.

• Create an init.lua file in your system. Use this command in your terminal if you don't know the specific location of Neovim's configuration folder.

  nvim --headless -c 'call mkdir(stdpath("config"), "p") | exe "edit" stdpath("config") . "/init.lua" | write | quit'

  To check the file was created you can use this command.

  nvim --headless -c 'echo $MYVIMRC' -c 'quit'

  This will show you the path of your init.lua

• Copy the content of init.lua in this repository into your own init.lua.

• Open Neovim, use the command nvim in your terminal. When Neovim starts all plugins will be downloaded automatically.

Learn how to use Neovim as a text editor

Neovim comes with an interactive tutorial that teaches the basics of the editor. The estimated time of this tutorial is around 45 minutes. It will show you how to move around text, how to execute commands and of course how to quit Neovim. You can access the tutorial by executing this command in your terminal.

nvim +Tutor

Note there is also a book inside Neovim's documentation, this is called the user manual. You can find it online here:

• Neovim online docs: user manual
• TJ DeVries reads Neovim's user manual (9h27min video)

Learn the basics of lua and Neovim's api

This configuration was created using a scripting language called lua, I highly recommend that you learn the syntax of this language. Learn just enough to know what is valid. Here are a couple resources:

• Learn X in Y minutes: Where X = lua
• Lua crash course (12min video)

Next step is to get familiar with Neovim's lua api, so you can create your own keybindings and commands. Here are a couple of guides you can read:

• Build your first Neovim configuration in lua
• Neovim's official lua guide

About language servers

They are external programs that provide IDE-like features to Neovim. If you want to know more about language servers watch this wonderful 5 minutes video: LSP explained.

To know what language servers are supported you need to go to nvim-lspconfig's documentation, in server_configuration.md you'll find links and instruction on how to install them.

Once you have a language server available in your system you need to add its setup function to your config.

For example, if you installed the typescript language server you need to add this.

require('lspconfig').tsserver.setup({})

About syntax highlight

To get a more accurate syntax highlight for your favorite language you need to download something called a "treesitter parser". These will be downloaded automatically by the plugin nvim-treesitter.

You can also instruct Neovim to download a treesitter parser by adding a name to the property ensure_installed located in the setup function of nvim-treesitter.configs.

Learn more about the plugin manager

lazy.nvim is the plugin manager used in this configuration. Here are a few resources that will help you understand some of it's features:

• Lazy.nvim: plugin configuration. Here you'll learn about the "plugin spec" and how to split your plugin setup into multiple files.

• Lazy.nvim: how to revert a plugin back to a previous version. Learn how to recover from a bad plugin update.

Plugins directory

Your plugins will be installed in a separate directory from your configuration. The location of this directory depends on your operating system and environment variables, so you'll need to execute this command to know where that is.

nvim --headless -c 'echo stdpath("data") . "/lazy/lazy.nvim" | quit'

Keybindings

Leader key: Space.

Mode	Key	Action
Normal	gy	Copy text to clipboard.
Normal	gp	Paste text from clipboard.
Normal	K	Displays hover information about the symbol under the cursor.
Normal	gd	Jump to the definition.
Normal	gD	Jump to declaration.
Normal	gi	Lists all the implementations for the symbol under the cursor.
Normal	go	Jumps to the definition of the type symbol
Normal	gr	Lists all the references.
Normal	gs	Displays a function's signature information.
Normal	<F2>	Renames all references to the symbol under the cursor.
Normal	<F3>	Format code in current buffer.
Normal	<F4>	Selects a code action available at the current cursor position.
Normal	gl	Show diagnostics in a floating window.
Normal	[d	Move to the previous diagnostic.
Normal	]d	Move to the next diagnostic.
Normal	gcc	Toggle comment in current line.
Operator	gc	Toggle comment in text.
Operator	sa	Add surrounding.
Normal	sd	Delete surrounding.
Normal	sr	Surround replace.
Normal	sf	Find surrounding.
Normal	<leader>e	Toggle file explorer.
Normal	<leader>E	Open file explorer in current folder.
Normal	<leader>bc	Close current buffer and preserve window layout.
Normal	<leader>?	Search oldfiles history.
Normal	<leader><space>	Search open buffers.
Normal	<leader>ff	Find file in current working directory.
Normal	<leader>fg	Search pattern in current working directory. Interactive "grep search".
Normal	<leader>fd	Search diagnostics in current file.
Normal	<leader>fs	Search pattern in current file.

Autocomplete keybindings

Mode	Key	Action
Insert	<Ctrl-y>	Confirm completion.
Insert	<Enter>	Confirm completion.
Insert	<Ctrl-e>	Cancel completion.
Insert	<Ctrl-p>	Move to previous item.
Insert	<Ctrl-n>	Move to next item.
Insert	<Ctrl-u>	Scroll up in documentation window.
Insert	<Ctrl-d>	Scroll down in documentation window.
Insert	<Ctrl-b>	Jump to the previous snippet placeholder.
Insert	<Ctrl-f>	Jump to the next snippet placeholder.
Insert	<Ctrl-Space>	Trigger completion.

Plugin list

Name	Description
lazy.nvim	Plugin manager.
tokyonight.nvim	Collection of colorscheme for Neovim.
which-key.nvim	Provide clues for keymaps.
lualine.nvim	Pretty statusline.
mini.nvim	Collection of independent lua modules that enhance Neovim's features.
plenary.nvim	Collection of lua modules. It helps plugin authors solve common problems.
telescope.nvim	Fuzzy finder.
telescope-fzf-native.nvim	Extension for telescope. Allows fzf-like syntax in search queries.
nvim-treesitter	Configures treesitter parsers. Provides modules to manipulate code.
lsp-zero.nvim	Bundles the boilerplate code needed to configure lspconfig and nvim-cmp.
nvim-lspconfig	Quickstart configs for Neovim's LSP client.
nvim-cmp	Autocompletion engine.
cmp-nvim-lsp	nvim-cmp source. Show suggestions based on LSP servers queries.
cmp-buffer	nvim-cmp source. Suggest words in the current buffer.
LuaSnip	Snippet engine.