Why Error E172 on Execution?

Question

Code

"" http://vi.stackexchange.com/a/7787/2923
function! OpenSelectionAsTabs() range
    let tabnr = tabpagenr()
    for line in range(a:firstline, a:lastline)
        execute "tabedit " . getline(line)
        execute "tabp"
    endfor
endfunction

nnoremap <leader>gf :'<,'>call OpenSelectionAsTabs()<CR>
vnoremap <leader>gf :call OpenSelectionAsTabs()<CR>

Filelist where I select two files in Visual mode and Press <leader>gf

/Users/masi/Raspberry Pi/me-hello-yes.tex
/Users/masi/hello.tex
...

Output

Error detected while processing function OpenSelectionAsTabs:
line    3:
E172: Only one file name allowed: tabedit /Users/masi/Raspberry Pi/me-hello-yes.tex

There are several complications such as artifact tabs. I think the empty spaces can be one source of the problem.

---

Why is there the error message E172?

Answer 1

You need to escape the line so that

tabedit /Users/masi/Raspberry Pi/me-hello-yes.tex

becomes

tabedit /Users/masi/Raspberry\ Pi/me-hello-yes.tex

Otherwise, tabedit sees two filenames /Users/masi/Raspberry and Pi/me-hello-yes.tex.

You can do this with the function fnameescape():

execute "tabedit " . fnameescape(getline(line))