How can I format a function declaration to force curly brace at the end of the line?

Question

I have big portions of code where functions are formatted with the opening curly brace on the next line, like this :

function foo()
{
}

I'm trying to figure out how to search / replace in order to change it to this :

function foo(){
}

Today, most languages have tools to format code consistently and allow you to change a convention afterwards. Since you did not specify the language, I cannot point you to a tool for your language. But for example there is prettier.io which allows you to format a wide variety of languages. Integration into vim can be done via formatprg or use a plugin such as github.com/prettier/vim-prettier or github.com/sbdchd/neoformat. — Hotschke, Apr 3 '19 at 15:13
This is for Wordpress, so a mix of php and html. prettier.io seems nice, but the PHP plugin is in alpha stage and not recommended for production. I'll have a look at the other ones. In the end I'm also happy to learn vimscript by implementing my own simple solutions on a specific need basis. — mike23, Apr 4 '19 at 5:44
I did a quick check on some of the php & html formatters: as far as I see none of them supports mixed html/php files php-cs-fixer, prettier-php. So you have to apply them manually on code parts and it cannot be fully automated. I also doubt that vim can provide any help with that except manually running substitute commands. But this is a general vim feature not specific to formatting which adds your question to the long list of how can I replace X with Y. — Hotschke, Apr 4 '19 at 7:22

padawin · Accepted Answer · 2019-04-04 07:34:16Z

4

You can use the new line character is your search (\n for linux):

:%s/)\s*\n{/){/c

Replaces )\s*\n{ into ){

The c flag at the end will ask you to confirm before each replacement.

EDIT: Another solution would be to use the join line feature (J) with the g command:

:g/function [^{]\+$/join

Which will execute the command join on every line matching the pattern function [^{]\+$ ("function" followed by anything without a {).

It will however put a space by default between ) and {, it can be changed by running the following before the g command:

:set nojoinspaces

answered Apr 3 '19 at 14:49

padawin

8838 bronze badges

1

You dont need norm J, :join is an ex command – D. Ben Knoble Apr 3 '19 at 17:17
Thanks! I did not know this one :-) – padawin Apr 3 '19 at 22:23
And even if you did need norm you should use norm! instead. I think. – klaus Apr 4 '19 at 3:56
@padawin thanks, I like the join solution, as it can easily be adapted to apply the formatting to Classes also. – mike23 Apr 4 '19 at 7:50

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