wsl-copy

Maybe obsolete disclaimer ⚠️

I made this plugin back in 2018, back when WSL had no GUI support, and connecting it to an X server was not officially supported and a hassle.

Now in 2023 WSL 2 supports X11 and Wayland natively, on both Windows 11 and Windows 10, through WSLg. Therefore you can now in most cases copy to system clipboard on WSL using the same approach and tools as on a native Linux installation.

Description

Enables yanking text from vim to windows clipboard on Windows Subsystem for Linux.

Use :Wsly from visual mode to copy the current selection.

Use :Wsly from normal mode to copy the last selection.

Map to a key combination in order to use it with standard vim operands, like *aw to yank a word, *$ to yank until the end of the line, etc (replacing * with the key combination you choose).

Remapping

Map the plugin to the keys of your choice:

nmap <silent> <new command> <Plug>WslCopy
xmap <silent> <new command> <Plug>WslCopy

For example:

nmap <silent> <leader>y <Plug>WslCopy
xmap <silent> <leader>y <Plug>WslCopy

How to install

Install using your favorite package manager or use vim's built in package support:

mkdir -p ~/.vim/pack/christianfosli/start
cd ~/.vim/pack/christianfosli/start
git clone https://github.com/christianfosli/wsl-copy.git
vim :helptags ~/.vim/pack/christianfosli/start/wsl-copy/docs

If you are using neovim, replace ~/.vim with $XDG_DATA_HOME/nvim (normally ~/.local/share/nvim).