ALE not finding filetype, making linting difficult

Question

when I open a file named i2c-dev.c in vi. Then I enter

:let g:ale_linters = {'c': ['clang-tidy']}

I am unable to use my installed linter "clang-tidy". I don't see any changes to the status bar, or the column on the left indicate lines that not complaint with the linter .

ALEInfo is pasted below.

 Current Filetype:
Available Linters: []
  Enabled Linters: []
  Ignored Linters: []
 Suggested Fixers:
  'remove_trailing_lines' - Remove all blank lines at the end of a file.
  'trim_whitespace' - Remove all trailing whitespace characters at the end of every line.
 Linter Variables:
 Global Variables:
let g:ale_cache_executable_check_failures = v:null
let g:ale_change_sign_column_color = v:null
let g:ale_command_wrapper = v:null
let g:ale_completion_delay = v:null
let g:ale_completion_enabled = 0
let g:ale_completion_max_suggestions = v:null
let g:ale_disable_lsp = 0
let g:ale_echo_cursor = 1
let g:ale_echo_msg_error_str = 'Error'
let g:ale_echo_msg_format = v:null
let g:ale_echo_msg_info_str = 'Info'
let g:ale_echo_msg_warning_str = 'Warning'
let g:ale_enabled = 1
let g:ale_fix_on_save = 0
let g:ale_fixers = {}
let g:ale_history_enabled = 1
let g:ale_history_log_output = 1
let g:ale_keep_list_window_open = v:null
let g:ale_lint_delay = 200
let g:ale_lint_on_enter = 1
let g:ale_lint_on_filetype_changed = 1
let g:ale_lint_on_insert_leave = 1
let g:ale_lint_on_save = 1
let g:ale_lint_on_text_changed = 'normal'
let g:ale_linter_aliases = {}
let g:ale_linters = {'c': ['clang-tidy']}
let g:ale_linters_explicit = 0
let g:ale_linters_ignore = {}
let g:ale_list_vertical = v:null
let g:ale_list_window_size = v:null
let g:ale_loclist_msg_format = v:null
let g:ale_max_buffer_history_size = v:null
let g:ale_max_signs = v:null
let g:ale_maximum_file_size = v:null
let g:ale_open_list = v:null
let g:ale_pattern_options = v:null
let g:ale_pattern_options_enabled = v:null
let g:ale_root = {}
let g:ale_set_balloons = 0
let g:ale_set_highlights = 1

I have the identification issue with python and cpp. Without identifying the file type I am unable to run any linters. I have clang-tidy installed. Let me know if I missed something in setup, or if this is a configuration I missed, or a bug.

$uname -a
Linux MYmachine 5.12.7-arch1-1 #1 SMP PREEMPT Wed, 26 May 2021 22:03:57 +0000 x86_64 GNU/Linux

Answer 1

You need at least filetype on for filetype detection.