Re: A modern look for gvim (win32)

On 28/07/11 09:58, Tobbe Lundberg wrote:
[...]
> I see a few possible solutions.
> 1. Keep the status bar exactly as it is. I think this is the only way
> to be 100% backwards compatible.
> 2. Create a GUI statusbar, but make it just an empty field and write
> whatever the user has set as "statusline" in it. Will probably
> have to use a smaller/different font than guifont to make
> everything fit.

IMHO this could still be 100% compatible. I think the font would not
necessarily have to be smaller (after all, the current 'statusline'
option uses the same 'guifont' as the rest of the window, with added
empty space or filename truncation to make everything fit. I suppose
that in this case it would be permissible to use a different font on the
status line (as in the tooltip balloons and the menus, for Athena and
Motif), but is it possible to use both font= and gui= guibg= guifg=
guisp= in a single :hi command? Or else, a new option, defaulting to
'guifont' if empty.

> 3. Create a GUI statusbar with support for dividing it up in
> different fields. It would use a special syntax for configuring
> it, for example using the pipe character (|) to specify a new
> field.

Why reinvent the wheel? Option 2 above seems perfectly viable to me, if
it can be implemented.

>
> (The gui status bar is raised by default, a field is a sunken part of
> the status bar, giving it borders all around.)
>
> Option 2 and 3 can probably be combined.
>
> So the best option is probably to implement both 1 and 2/3, and then
> let the user choose which one he/she prefers.
>
> > You mean I could not use gvim anymore the way I like it, with custom
> > statusline and text-style tabs, but also any installed monospace
> > font I damn well please? That's certainly a no-no. Any controversial
> > change should be optional.
>
> No, that is not what I mean. But you are not the only one who
> understood it that way, so I must have expressed myself poorly.
>
> What I meant was that you could still use vim on ancient machines
> with "no other keyboard than a plain typewriter keyboard, and no
> mouse" or machines with only a terminal. I.e. you can still use
> vim where vim has always been the only option. Gvim will still
> be usable in any setting it has previously been usable.
>
> See above for my proposal for the status line. Of course you will
> be able to pick any monospaced font you want for the editor.
> What do you mean by "text-style tabs"?

The kind of tabs you get above the Vim screen contents, in console mode,
or in GUI mode with the e flag excluded from 'guioptions'. It is
customizable with the 'tabline' option. When empty (default), Vim uses
"a default tab pages line". To see what it looks like in gvim, use

:set go-=e stal=2

(where 'stal' or 'showtabline' has possible values 0=never, 1=only if at
least 2 tabs present, 2=always).

Historically, the text-style tabline appeared a few snapshots earlier
than the GUI-style tabline (with go+=e and 'guitablabel') during Vim 7.0
alpha development and I adopted it immediately. I still use it because
it gives me a more uniform look & feel between vim and gvim.

Best regards,
Tony.
--
The law will never make men free; it is men who have got to make the
law free.
-- Henry David Thoreau

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