[SOLVED] vim color highlighting not correctly displayed in vc/tty

Noble · 2010-07-25 22:42:01

For instance visual selection is set up to change fg/bg to black/green but changes fg to green. Under x using urxvt it displays correctly.

Last edited by Noble (2010-07-26 21:22:19)

rockin turtle · 2010-07-26 05:30:15

I believe I have had this problem as well. Let me ask you, are you trying to use some of the .vim files from

http://code.google.com/p/vimcolorschemetest/

for instance?

If so, the problem is due to most .vim files being useful only in gvim and not tty vim.

It is possible to use these .vim files under vim run on urxvt (I do this now), but you have to do the following:

1) Select a small set of .vim files that you like.
2) Re-write those files to be compatible with a terminal version of vim
3) Re-configure urxvt to use the colors specified by your chosen .vim file

This sounds like quite a bit of monkeying around, and in fact there is quite a lot to do. I wrote a python script that does all this. It's about 350 lines of python in a single file. If you were interested I could post the file. You would basically have to run the script just once, and from then on everything would be configured. If you decided you wanted to use a different .vim file, then you would need to run the script again.

Noble · 2010-07-26 06:36:01

I have written my own syntax highlight theme, post below. If you think your script could do anything about it after looking at the file please post But as I said, vim works fine in urxvt, but not when I switch out of X and run it in the vc/tty.

:set statusline=#%n\ %y\ %F\ %r\ %=%c\ %l/%L
:set hlsearch
:set nocompatible
:set noexrc
:set number
:syntax enable
:set autochdir
:set backup
:set backupdir=~/.vim/backup
:set directory=~/.vim/tmp
:set autoindent
:set ruler
:set nowrap
:set nocp
:set scrolloff=5
:set sidescrolloff=5
:set fileformats=unix,dos,mac
:set title
:set laststatus=2
:set tabstop=4
:set autoread
:set showcmd
:set showmatch
:set shiftwidth=4
:set smarttab
:set backspace=indent,eol,start
filetype on
filetype plugin on
filetype indent on

hi clear
set background=dark
if exists("syntax_on")
  syntax reset
endif

highlight ErrorMsg         ctermfg=red         ctermbg=none         cterm=bold
highlight WarningMsg    ctermfg=red            ctermbg=none        cterm=bold
highlight VertSplit        ctermfg=green        ctermbg=black
highlight Folded        ctermfg=magenta        ctermbg=none
highlight FoldColumn    ctermfg=magenta        ctermbg=none
highlight FoldColumn    ctermfg=magenta
highlight LineNr         ctermfg=green                             cterm=bold
highlight ModeMsg         ctermfg=lightgreen                         cterm=bold
highlight MatchParen     ctermfg=black         ctermbg=green
highlight Normal         ctermfg=white         ctermbg=none
highlight SignColumn    ctermfg=magenta
highlight NonText        ctermfg=blue
highlight Question        ctermfg=red                                cterm=bold
highlight Comment         ctermfg=8
highlight Constant         ctermfg=green                               cterm=none
highlight Identifier     ctermfg=white                             cterm=bold
highlight Statement      ctermfg=lightgreen                           cterm=bold 
highlight PreProc         ctermfg=10
highlight Type             ctermfg=2
highlight Special         ctermfg=cyan
highlight Error            ctermfg=red            ctermbg=none
highlight Todo             ctermfg=yellow        ctermbg=none        cterm=bold
highlight StatusLine     ctermfg=black         ctermbg=green         cterm=none
highlight StatusLineNc    ctermfg=black        ctermbg=lightgreen    cterm=none
highlight Directory        ctermfg=white
highlight Search        ctermfg=black        ctermbg=green        cterm=none    
highlight Visual        ctermfg=black        ctermbg=lightgreen
highlight WildMenu        ctermfg=black        ctermbg=cyan        cterm=none
highlight Pmenu            ctermfg=black        ctermbg=green
highlight PmenuSel        ctermfg=black        ctermbg=lightgreen    cterm=none

steve___ · 2010-07-26 12:28:38

Try something like this:
http://git.cinderwick.ca/?p=vimbrant.gi … 20;hb=HEAD

Noble · 2010-07-26 15:15:13

Tried it but alas, no luck. It did change the colors of my tty/vc, but the background property does still not work.

rockin turtle · 2010-07-26 20:42:59

Noble, I see I misunderstood your problem.

I have a couple of things you could try.
From your console, type:

$echo $TERM

this should show what type of terminal your console is. On my machine it is 'linux'.
Next, type:

$tput colors

This will tell you the number of colors your terminal is capable of displaying. My console has 8 colors. As I read through the online vim help, I noticed a comment that said something like setting the attributes for background colors doesn't always work on 8-color terminals. (To read for yourself, start vim then type ':help ctermfg'.) To me, this appears to be your probem. I'm not sure, though, and I don't know what you could do about that.

Another thing you could try. From your console, type:

$tput setaf | hexdump -C
$tput setab | hexdump -C

This will show you the escape sequences needed to set the colors (foreground and background) for your terminal. On my console, I get the following output:

$tput setab | hexdump -C
00000000 1b 5b 34 25 70 31 25 64 6d |.[4%p1%dm|
00000009

$tput setaf | hexdump -C
00000000 1b 5b 33 25 70 31 25 64 6d |.[3%p1%dm|
00000009

From this you can see the escape sequences needed to set the foreground and background colors for your console. To get vim to use these sequences, put the following in your .vimrc (you should make a copy of your .vimrc file before doing this, in case it screws things up):

if term == linux
set t_ab=^[[4%p1%dm
set t_af=^[[3%p1%dm
endif

Note: in the above text, the appearent 2 character sequence "^[" is, in fact, the single ascii escape character. If you type the above verbatim, it will not work. Instead of typing the "^[", type (in insert mode) 'ctrl-v' followed by the escape key. You should see vim insert a ^[ in your text.

I don't expect this will work for you as it appears that vim can't set the background on 8 color terminals, but you can give it a shot.

Noble · 2010-07-26 21:22:03

Thanks for a very helpful and descriptive post rockin turtle.

I tried everything mentioned above, and some mixes of them. Suddly, it worked! I removed bit by bit, and without any color hacks at all I had a working line in my config!

highlight Visual ctermfg=white ctermbg=green cterm=bold

the strang thing is that its not different from what I had, and that the added cterm=bold seems to have done the trick!

Well well, I learned a lot about terminals and colors

Cheers!

Arch Linux

#1 2010-07-25 22:42:01

[SOLVED] vim color highlighting not correctly displayed in vc/tty

#2 2010-07-26 05:30:15

Re: [SOLVED] vim color highlighting not correctly displayed in vc/tty

#3 2010-07-26 06:36:01

Re: [SOLVED] vim color highlighting not correctly displayed in vc/tty

#4 2010-07-26 12:28:38

Re: [SOLVED] vim color highlighting not correctly displayed in vc/tty

#5 2010-07-26 15:15:13

Re: [SOLVED] vim color highlighting not correctly displayed in vc/tty

#6 2010-07-26 20:42:59

Re: [SOLVED] vim color highlighting not correctly displayed in vc/tty

#7 2010-07-26 21:22:03

Re: [SOLVED] vim color highlighting not correctly displayed in vc/tty

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