Switch color schemes

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created 2002 · complexity intermediate · version 7.0

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You can easily change your color scheme, but it can be hard to compare several schemes to decide what's best for you. It may help to view a one-page summary  of many color schemes. Alternatively, the script presented below allows you to quickly change colors by pressing a key. If you like variety, you can start Vim with a different scheme depending upon the time of day.

Contents

[

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One page summary of color schemesEdit

Nate Kane has created a overview and search page  showing sample Ruby code in many different color schemes.

Some of the color schemes are provided with Vim. For example, the following command should show the elflord scheme:

:colorscheme elflord

Note that if you are using Vim over SSH or in certain color-limited terminals you may need to tell Vim to use 256 color mode in order to have the color schemes display with greater accuracy by using the command :set t_Co=256 .

Switching colorsEdit

The script shown below defines these key mappings:

• Press F8 to use the next color scheme.
• Press Shift-F8 to use the previous color scheme.
• Press Alt-F8 to use a random color scheme.

The next/previous/random color scheme selection uses a list of scheme names maintained by the script. The list can be controlled with these commands (the default is all):

:SetColors all

To use all installed color schemes ($VIMRUNTIME/colors/*.vim).

:SetColors my

To use names built into the script (define these names by editing the script to change the variables c1, c2 and c3).

:SetColors blue slate ron

To use the schemes specified (scheme names, separated with a space, for example, blue slate ron).

:SetColors

To display the current list of scheme names.

After using :SetColors to list the scheme names (and while the list is still displayed), you could type :colors d then press Tab to expand 'd' to a color scheme name starting with 'd'. Then press Enter to invoke the color scheme (:colorsis an abbreviation for :colorscheme).

Enter :SetColors now to set the current color scheme based on the time of day. Change the colors used by editing the nowcolors variable in the script, for example:

let nowcolors = 'breeze earth less aqua gothic'

ScriptEdit

• Create and save file setcolors.vim containing the script below.
• In Vim, use the command :source setcolors.vim to execute the script so you can experiment with its features.
• Alternatively, if you save the script in file ~/.vim/plugin/setcolors.vim (Unix) or $HOME/vimfiles/plugin/setcolors.vim (Windows), it will be available whenever you start Vim.

" Change the color scheme from a list of color scheme names.

" Version 2010-09-12 from http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/VimTip341

" Press key:

" F8 next scheme

" Shift-F8 previous scheme

" Alt-F8 random scheme

" Set the list of color schemes used by the above (default is 'all'):

"  :SetColors all (all $VIMRUNTIME/colors/*.vim)

"  :SetColors my (names built into script)

"  :SetColors blue slate ron (these schemes)

"  :SetColors (display current scheme names)

" Set the current color scheme based on time of day:

"  :SetColors now

if v:version < 700 || exists('loaded_setcolors') || &cp

finish

endif

let loaded_setcolors = 1

let s:mycolors = ['slate', 'torte', 'darkblue', 'delek', 'murphy', 'elflord', 'pablo', 'koehler'] " colorscheme names that we use to set color

" Set list of color scheme names that we will use, except

" argument 'now' actually changes the current color scheme.

function! s:SetColors(args)

if len(a:args) == 0

echo 'Current color scheme names:'

let i = 0

while i < len(s:mycolors)

echo ' '.join(map(s:mycolors[i : i+4], 'printf("%-14s", v:val)'))

let i += 5

endwhile

elseif a:args == 'all'

let paths = split(globpath(&runtimepath, 'colors/*.vim'), "\n")

let s:mycolors = map(paths, 'fnamemodify(v:val, ":t:r")')

echo 'List of colors set from all installed color schemes'

elseif a:args == 'my'

let c1 = 'default elflord peachpuff desert256 breeze morning'

let c2 = 'darkblue gothic aqua earth black_angus relaxedgreen'

let c3 = 'darkblack freya motus impact less chocolateliquor'

let s:mycolors = split(c1.' '.c2.' '.c3)

echo 'List of colors set from built-in names'

elseif a:args == 'now'

call s:HourColor()

else

let s:mycolors = split(a:args)

echo 'List of colors set from argument (space-separated names)'

endif

endfunction

command! -nargs=* SetColors call s:SetColors('<args>')

" Set next/previous/random (how = 1/-1/0) color from our list of colors.

" The 'random' index is actually set from the current time in seconds.

" Global (no 's:') so can easily call from command line.

function! NextColor(how)

call s:NextColor(a:how, 1)

endfunction

" Helper function for NextColor(), allows echoing of the color name to be

" disabled.

function! s:NextColor(how, echo_color)

if len(s:mycolors) == 0

call s:SetColors('all')

endif

if exists('g:colors_name')

let current = index(s:mycolors, g:colors_name)

else

let current = -1

endif

let missing = []

let how = a:how

for i in range(len(s:mycolors))

if how == 0

let current = localtime() % len(s:mycolors)

let how = 1 " in case random color does not exist

else

let current += how

if !(0 <= current && current < len(s:mycolors))

let current = (how>0 ? 0 : len(s:mycolors)-1)

endif

endif

try

execute 'colorscheme '.s:mycolors[current]

break

catch /E185:/

call add(missing, s:mycolors[current])

endtry

endfor

redraw

if len(missing) > 0

echo 'Error: colorscheme not found:' join(missing)

endif

if (a:echo_color)

echo g:colors_name

endif

endfunction

nnoremap <F8> :call NextColor(1)<CR>

nnoremap <S-F8> :call NextColor(-1)<CR>

nnoremap <A-F8> :call NextColor(0)<CR>

" Set color scheme according to current time of day.

function! s:HourColor()

let hr = str2nr(strftime('%H'))

if hr <= 3

let i = 0

elseif hr <= 7

let i = 1

elseif hr <= 14

let i = 2

elseif hr <= 18

let i = 3

else

let i = 4

endif

let nowcolors = 'elflord morning desert evening pablo'

execute 'colorscheme '.split(nowcolors)[i]

redraw

echo g:colors_name

endfunction

Scrolling the color schemesEdit

You may want to impress your colleagues by having Vim change the color scheme periodically. The following might be your first attempt:

:autocmd CursorHold * call NextColor(1)

However, this fails because there is no timer event in Vim. The CursorHold event will fire only once when the user has been idle for the time specified with the 'updatetime' option (so if you stop typing, the color scheme will change once only).

If you want the color scheme to change every 10 seconds, execute the following command (press Ctrl-C to finish).

:while 1|sleep 10|call NextColor(1)|endwhile

ReferencesEdit

• :help :colorscheme
• :help g:colors_name

CommentsEdit

It's kind of weird that s:mycolors is set initially to something different than "my" or "all". You can't get that list back after using the script.

Wouldn't it be cool if you could edit the "my" list on the fly with some commands? Wouldn't it be even cooler if the "my" list was taken from a global variable, which could even be stored in the .viminfo file by including ! in the 'viminfo' option?

--Fritzophrenic  (talk ) 17:38, January 18, 2013 (UTC)

will iterate backgrounds squm

if v:version < 700 || exists('loaded_switchcolor') || &cp

finish

endif

let loaded_switchcolor = 1

let paths = split(globpath(&runtimepath, 'colors/*.vim'), "\n")

let s:swcolors = map(paths, 'fnamemodify(v:val, ":t:r")')

let s:swskip = [ '256-jungle', '3dglasses', 'calmar256-light', 'coots-beauty-256', 'grb256' ]

let s:swback = 0 " background variants light/dark was not yet switched

let s:swindex = 0

function! SwitchColor(swinc)

" if have switched background: dark/light

if (s:swback == 1)

let s:swback = 0

let s:swindex += a:swinc

let i = s:swindex % len(s:swcolors)

" in skip list

if (index(s:swskip, s:swcolors[i]) == -1)

execute "colorscheme " . s:swcolors[i]

else

return SwitchColor(a:swinc)

endif

else

let s:swback = 1

if (&background == "light")

execute "set background=dark"

else

execute "set background=light"

endif

" roll back if background is not supported

if (!exists('g:colors_name'))

return SwitchColor(a:swinc)

endif

endif

" show current name on screen. :h :echo-redraw

redraw

execute "colorscheme"

endfunction

map <F8>  :call SwitchColor(1)<CR>

imap <F8> <Esc>:call SwitchColor(1)<CR>

map <S-F8>  :call SwitchColor(-1)<CR>

imap <S-F8> <Esc>:call SwitchColor(-1)<CR>

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