Neovim

[danielepolencic]

Hi,

I really like the idea behind vimr. I was wondering if it wouldn't be easier to play with neovim and create an UI on top of it, rather than fiddling with MacVim.

I'm not an expert, so I don't know if this is feasible/convenient. What do you think?

[jordwalke]

Might it be possible to consider the underlying Vim experience an "implementation detail"? For now, it might be that just dropping MacVim.framework in is easier than getting neovim to work, but all of the work being done on Vimr would still apply if we swapped out the underlying implementation to be neovim?

[qvacua]

@danielepolencic : NeoVim is a quite interesting project. However, it is as @jordwalke says. Everything Vim in VimR is isolated, well almost 😳, in the MacVimFramework. If we would want to use NeoVim, we would rather do it in MacVimFramework, not in VimR. (one could/should then design a real bona fide framework...)

Besides, it would take a very^2 long time, at least for me, to implement a whole new GUI-component for NeoVim from scratch. By using MacVim, I can just use the existing GUI parts for free and am able to concentrate on other convenience features.

However, I'm quite curious about NeoVim: their goal seems to be not only to refactor (along with a new GUI API), but to create a new Vim. They must inevitably drift apart from the "original" Vim and get disconnected at some point. Or am I mistaken?

[kopischke]

@qvacua speaking as an observer and backer of Neovim, the Neovim community at large seems a bit conflicted on the whole “drift away from Vim” issue (I’m all in favor, and even suggested a mechanism for script by script compatibility opt-out, [neovim/neovim#503], but I’m in a minority); the core maintainers’ thinking currently seems to favor refactoring first, with possibly incompatible feature evolution a semi-distant second.

[jordwalke]

@kopischke, do you feel that Neovim's goals and vision conflicts with vimr? I don't personally see how it does, rather they seem complimentary. MacVim.framework is a hack - but a glorious hack that allows iterating on a more Mac-like container comparable to other modern editors like Sublime.

I think NeoVim sounds awesome, btw.

[kopischke]

@jordwalke not at all – in fact, one of Neovim’s stated goals is to decouple the UI from the core Vim experience (with a reference ncurses UI being maintained by the Neovim team itself), thus allowing more flexible UI embedding and better integration with external tools. One can easily see how both projects complement each other – on a theoretical level. Practically speaking, however, they have little to none in common – yet: MacVim is not Neovim based, and it is entirely unclear how much work converting it to use the Neovim core will be. Should that happens (here’s hoping!), seeing what @qvacua adds on top will be interesting.

I agree with the “awesome” part, which is why I backed the project early on :).

[jordwalke]

For the record, I don't want to pretend to speak for @qvacua, I was just giving my two cents. My impression was that neovim is liberating vim from the inside out and vimr is liberating vim from the outside in. I think vimr is a really great way to lay out a vision for what the Vim experience could be, along with a way to get there quickly. Can't wait to see what comes of all of this.

[mateusduboli]

+1 on @jordwalke vision.
What I'm seeing in Neovim is a development more focused on modernising the source code then the general Vim experience. Not that I think is a bad project, but the results will take longer to become noticeable.

[qvacua]

Yeah, when

• Neovim is advanced enough and
• VimR has matured also enough,

then we can try to write a new Cocoa NeoVim GUI from scratch and use it in VimR...

[adelarsq]

@qvacua Nice! I think that is the way to go.

[btipling]

I think people are already writing a Cocoa UI based on NeoVim's msgpack-rpc: https://github.com/neovim/neovim/wiki/Plugin-UI-architecture

[qvacua]

Oh, has NeoVim already implemented the UI-interface-part? And what project is it? I wanna know!

[justinmk]

Not quite. There are some experimental projects listed here:

https://github.com/neovim/neovim/wiki/Related-projects

NeoVimX hasn't been updated since the recent API changes so it won't work anymore. There was a cool video of it, can't find it anymore. API is nearing stabilization, so work on clients will hopefully accelerate after that.

[Stiivi]

There is a new OS X UI project that uses neovim: NeoVim.app. If the projects have similar goals in mind, it might be worth considering to merge the effort and experience.

[gglanzani]

I would personally love and welcome a merge with Neovim-dot-app. It is really becoming stable as to "a geek can use it everyday".