Give variable to makeprg

Question

I'm trying to put the output of a command into a QuickFix list when a particular key is pressed. That command takes as its argument the word under the cursor, so my function looks basically like this (example; ls is not actually my command):

set makeprg=ls\ $*

function MyFunction()
    let word = expand("<cword>")
    silent make word
    copen
endfunction

And what it does is call with the literal word word. If I use a $ before it, then the literal $ is used also.

How do I put the value of word into make instead of those four letters?

Answer 1

Most ex commands (except for :echo and :exe) take their arguments literally and do not evaluate VimScript expressions. To make that work, you need to wrap your command into an :exe command.

So you would need to do:

:exe "sil make" word

Have also a look the help :h :exe