A minimal bookmarks plugin for Neovim

Summary

• Features
• Installation
• Commands
• Keybindings
• How to edit bookmarks
• Screenshots
• FAQ

Features

• Written in Lua as a very small file (~345 lines) with no dependencies
• Bookmark current line
• Edit bookmarks as a file
  • Bookmarks are stored in a single file located at ~/.cache/nvim/minimal_bookmarks/database
• Toggle bookmarks window

Installation

Plugin Manager

Using vim-plug:

Vimscript:

call plug#begin()
...
Plug 'yuriescl/minimal-bookmarks.nvim'
...
call plug#end()

Lua:

vim.call('plug#begin')
...
Plug('yuriescl/minimal-bookmarks.nvim')
...
vim.call('plug#end')

For installation instructions using other plugin managers (e.g. packer.nvim, lazy.nvim), consult your plugin manager documentation.

Commands

Available commands:

• :MinimalBookmarksToggle: Toggle bookmarks window
• :MinimalBookmarksAdd: Add current line to end of bookmarks
  • If no argument is provided to this command, it will prompt for the bookmark name
  • A bookmark name can be provided as an argument, e.g. :MinimalBookmarksAdd location1
• :MinimalBookmarksInsert: Insert current line into beginning of bookmarks
  • If no argument is provided to this command, it will prompt for the bookmark name
  • A bookmark name can be provided as an argument, e.g. :MinimalBookmarksInsert location1
• :MinimalBookmarksEdit: Edit bookmarks file (this is the only way to edit bookmarks)
• :MinimalBookmarksShow: Show bookmarks window
• :MinimalBookmarksHide: Hide bookmarks window

Keybindings

By default, this plugin does not create keybindings. You can set your own keybindings in your init.vim or init.lua file.

Examples:

Vimscript:

nnoremap <silent> <leader>bb :MinimalBookmarksToggle<CR>
nnoremap <silent> <leader>be :MinimalBookmarksEdit<CR>
nnoremap <silent> <leader>ba :MinimalBookmarksAdd<CR>
nnoremap <silent> <leader>bi :MinimalBookmarksInsert<CR>

Lua:

vim.api.nvim_set_keymap('n', '<leader>bb', ':MinimalBookmarksToggle<CR>', { noremap = true, silent = true })
vim.api.nvim_set_keymap('n', '<leader>be', ':MinimalBookmarksEdit<CR>', { noremap = true, silent = true })
vim.api.nvim_set_keymap('n', '<leader>ba', ':MinimalBookmarksAdd<CR>', { noremap = true, silent = true })
vim.api.nvim_set_keymap('n', '<leader>bi', ':MinimalBookmarksInsert<CR>', { noremap = true, silent = true })

How to edit bookmarks

Run :MinimalBookmarksEdit to open the bookmarks file.
The file is located at ~/.cache/nvim/minimal_bookmarks/database.

You can freely edit the file, but be careful not to break the format. The format is simple: each line is a bookmark, and each line has the format:

{line_number}|{name}|{file_path}|{a part of the original line content}

Example of a bookmark entry in the file:

13|location1|/home/yuri/.config/nvim/init.lua|vim.cmd([[

Screenshots

Bookmarks window (press Enter in a bookmark to jump to it):

Bookmarks file (freely edit the bookmarks database - it's a normal text file):

FAQ

• Why not just use existing bookmark plugins like vim-bookmarks or bookmarks.nvim?

  • I tried them but found them difficult to configure, buggy and a bit bloated with unnecessary features. I just wanted something for quickly jumping to specific lines in my files. Searched for a plugin that does this, didn't find, so I wrote this one.

• Why aren't there more features?

  • With the goal of keeping this plugin minimalistic (therefore less prone to bugs, and less prone to unpredictable behavior), I decided to not include additional features like:
    • Per-directory bookmarks
    • Edit bookmarks inside bookmarks window
    • Line marks (e.g. bookmark sign on the line)
    • Bookmark tracking (e.g. track if bookmarked line goes up or down due to a file content change)