How to wrap lines on hotkey but not automatically?

Question

A bit of context: I'm trying to use NeoVim after Spacemacs. In Spacemacs, there is gql key combination that hard wraps current long line of text into multiple short lines. It is useful if I want to write a long documentation comment. So I write a single line and let the IDE figure out linebreaks.

When I'm trying to configure NeoVim to wrap lines. And I want to achieve the following behaviour:

1. Don't wrap lines automatically when reaching a specific limit (like 80 columns).
2. Wrap line (ideally preserving indentation) with some hotkey like gql.

I tried :set tw=80 and I can wrap lines by gqq, but they are also wrapped automatically...

How can I configure my NeoVim environment to do this?

Answer 1

:set fo-=tc

You can set 'formatoptions' with your preferences controlling when and how to format text.

See :help fo-table for the list of supported values in this option.

In particular, you'll want to remove these two:

t: Auto-wrap text using 'textwidth'

c: Auto-wrap comments using 'textwidth', inserting the current comment leader automatically.

So, to remove them:

set formatoptions-=tc

Or the short abbreviated form at the beginning of the answer.

You'll probably want to make sure you're preserving this one, applicable to comments specifically:

q: Allow formatting of comments with gq.

It's typically included in the default (which is tcq), so usually you don't need any action to keep it.

See also:

• The 'comments' option.
• The full fo-table for more useful options related to formatting and breaking lines.