Vim syntax pattern to highlight python keyword argument

Question

I'm struggling with learning vim regexps (I don't know any other regexp very well either), so the main problem is to define regexp that would match

some_function_call(simple_value, keyword=value)

keyword in this example.

So it should match a word if it's inside parens and have equal sign after it.

The next problem is how to define syntax files in vim. I would appreciate help with that, but It shouldn't be that hard to learn, so I can do that on my own probably.

EDIT based on the answer I've maid my own syntax script for python. Feel free to try it. enter link description here

Answer 1

With these settings:

syn region FCall start='[[:alpha:]_]\i*\s*(' end=')' contains=FCall,FCallKeyword
syn match FCallKeyword /\i*\ze\s*=[^=]/ contained
hi FCallKeyword ctermfg=yellow

I get:

Here:

1. I define a syntax region within which keyword arguments can be found, which would be the function call. The contains option lets me nest function calls.
2. Within that region, I match any string made of valid identifier characters (\i*) followed by =, but not ==, so that equality tests are not matched.

By using regions, I get to nest the matches as much as I need, which would have be very complicated (impossible?) if I'd gone for just a match with regular expressions.

I believe the regular expressions used for matching the function call and the keyword can be refined, but considering what's valid in Python 3, that's not a task I'm willing to take on.

Optionally, I think you can use this to highlight function calls, using a matchgroup:

syn region FCall matchgroup=FName start='[[:alpha:]_]\i*\s*(' end=')' contains=FCall,FCallKeyword
syn match FCallKeyword /\i*\ze\s*=[^=]/ contained
hi FCallKeyword ctermfg=yellow
hi FName ctermfg=blue

Answer 2

Here is where you can start from:

/([^,]\+,\s\(\w\+\)=.*)

Decomposing:

/(       start matching a (
[^,]\+   match multiple characters that are not ,
,\s      match a , and a space
\(       start a matching group
\w\+     match word characters
\)       end the matching group
=.*)      match an = and anything until the closing )

This needs improvements but gives you an overview of how you can do it.

Answer 3

In addition to @Nobe4 answer you could do the following:

• Create the file ~/.vim/after/syntax/python.vim

• Put theses line in the file:

  syntax match PythonArg /(.*\,\s*\zs\w\+\ze\s*=.*)/
  hi PythonArg guibg=blue
  

• Adapt the second one with your prefered values.

This will create a syntax file which will add a syntax match for your arguments followed by a = and set the style to use. This topic :h mysyntaxfile-add should be interesting for you.

Also I used a different regex than the other answer, here is the detail (I don't know which one works better so you'll probably have to try):

(      Begin the pattern with a bracket
.*,    Look for any number of any character before a ,
\s*    Zero or more white spaces after the ,
\zs    Start the matching group (what will be highlighted)
\w\+   Match one or more word characters
\ze    End the matching group
\s*    Zero or more white spaces between your argument and the = sign
=      A literal = sign after your argument
.*)    Any number of any characters between your = sign and the closing bracket

Answer 4

I found that @Wolfie's answer captures unwrapping of a tuple as a keyword and it also had trouble capturing linebroken keyword arguments.

Inspired by his regex I came up with the following to put in my python.vim syntax file. (Bear in mind that I'm originally using the python.vim syntax file from sheerun/vim-polyglot)

syn match pythonFunctionKeyword "\v\s{-}\zs\w+\ze\=(\=)@!(\_s)@!" display
syn cluster pythonExpression add=pythonFunctionKeyword
syn region pythonFunctionKwargs start=+(+ end=+)+ contains=@pythonExpression

And the regex breakdown is very similar to @Wolfie's answer:

\v      set to very magic mode
\s{-}   capture whitespace, nongreedy
\zs     start of the match (what to actually highlight)
\w+     one or more alphanumeric character, underscore included
\ze     stop matching; anything after this is delimiting only
\=      one single equal sign
(\=)@!  ...not followed by another equal sign
(\_s)@! ...not followed by any whitespace or newline character

Note that this will not color a keyword argument written as: key = value. Which I consider a good thing, as that goes against the official PEP-8 whitespace recommendation for keyword arguments.

Answer 5

The as-of-writing accepted answer broke highlighting for strings inside function argument lists for me (by what alchemy I do not know), so here's a hopefully more safe version, based on Statox' one.

syntax match PythonArg "\v[\(\,]\s{-}\zs\w+\ze\s{-}\=(\=)@!"
hi PythonArg ctermfg = 214 guifg = #ffaf00

ctermfg is for console terminal, guifg is for gui. Of course you're free to change the colors to whatever you find fancy. Here's a handy list.

As always, you do best putting this inside ~/.vim/after/syntax/python.vim

For a regex breakdown, here you go:

\v      set to very magic mode
[\(\,]  capture either a ( or a ,
\s{-}   capture whitespace, nongreedy
\zs     start of the match (what to actually highlight)
\w+     one or more alphanumeric character, underscore included
\ze     stop matching; anything after this is delimiting only
\s{-}   once again, capture whitespace.
\=      one single equal sign
(\=)@!  ...not followed by another equal sign

The final check stops the highlighting from coloring conditionals. You can remove if it you want.