How do I jump to tags instead of lines?

Question

I'm using vim as note-taking software. My notes grow to thousands of lines across 7 different files.

If I was writing code, I would be able to jump to a function definition in a different file with a vim plugin. Or if I open a list of compile errors or grep matches in vim, I could jump to a line in a different file with just two keypresses.

My problem is that I want to jump to one note file from another. This will probably involve tagging the location i wish to jump to.

Hopefully you know what I'm asking now. I can't type in a reference to a second file, (other than using the exact line number file:999 ), but I still need a way to type in references in the files, since I want to organize the same tasks across different note-files.

How can I do this? Would writing in markdown help?

https://superuser.com/questions/290082/how-can-i-configure-custom-vim-tags-for-my-text-file-notes offers a solution by binding a key to vimgrep

Answer 1

There are probably better ways but you could the help functionality as long as the filetype being help is ok. I basically use it to write down things I'm learning as I keep learning how to use gvim, it's only been 20 years :).

At the moment I have one file that I edit elsewhere then copy to where the help file is as an archive. It's hit 1600 lines so I'll start breaking it up into separate files, ie a index and section by section.

At the bottom or top of each document you need something like vim:tw=88:ts=4:sw=4:ft=help:norl:foldmethod=indent:foldclose=all:modifiable:noreadonly:conceallevel=3

The important bits

• vim - Thanks to @D. Benknoble it sets the file up to load vim related flags, poor summary :(

• tw=88 - Sets the text width. I use a big screen

• ts=4 - Sets tab spaces to 4
• ft=help - Important Sets the filetype to text
• noreadonly - Probably dangerous as it allows edits
• foldmethod=indent - I use indenting to separate the top level headings and the detail heading, dunno the vim word for headings :)

Then you define a help topic as follows

|sf-search-flags| - | sets the tag and allows jumping between tags using CTRL-]

And the sub topics as so

*sf-search-flags* - Where CTRL-] takes you. You can go to the previous tag using CTRL-o

It looks like this

Ctrl-] on sf-search-flags takes you to

The colours are syntax formatting I'm playing with to make things stand out with out bold etc

After you save the file you need to use

:helptags {dir} (dir) is Optional if you are in the directory) to build the help file tags

See

h :help

h :helptags

:help modeline

Update: Fixed an error and added a better screenshot

Answer 2

I think with vim-wiki you can set anchors (from the help):

Anchors~

A wikilink, interwiki link or diary link can be followed by a '#' and the name
of an anchor.  When opening a link, the cursor jumps to the anchor. >
  [[Todo List#Tomorrow|Tasks for tomorrow]]

To jump inside the current wiki file you can omit the file: >
  [[#Tomorrow]]

See |vimwiki-anchors| for how to set an anchor.

Answer 3

Another solution I'm playing around with (for my own minimalist wiki setup) is the following (assume all notes are in ~/notes):

• setlocal path+=$HOME/notes/** for any files in ~/notes (this can be done with autocommands or with ftplugins by adding note. to the filetype of any file in ~/notes, though the latter is slightly more complicated)
• use gf to jump between files: no special syntax required, just type the name of a file and gf it (like a cross link)
• if you use gF instead, you can have references with line numbers (not quite like tags, though)
• use :find and its variants to interactively find a file to jump to
• use :vimgrep /.../ ~/notes/** to search