Using the "vim" editor for PL/SQL Programming

INTRODUCTION

As mentioned in Chapter 3, I am a big fan of a free editor known as "vim"

which has broad compatibility with (but many more cool features than) Unix's

"vi." Vim has both console-based and GUI versions, and it runs on almost

anything. Its feature list is as long as your arm and if you want it to

do something new, you can program it yourself.

Vim has a dedicated community of developers who contribute files enabling

vim to provide support for their favorite languages. You guessed it, there

is reasonably good support for PL/SQL.

DOWNLOADING AND INSTALLING THE BASE PACKAGE

You can download and run vim from <http://www.vim.org>

On the download page, you will have a choice as to whether you or not you want

to download the "runtime" files with the core package. If this is your first

time to install vim, you need both. (FYI, the PL/SQL definition files are part

of the "runtime" package.)

Once you get it downloaded, run the installation per the instructions on the

web page.

GETTING THE LATEST PL/SQL-SPECIFIC FILES

At any given point in time, the official distribution may or may not have

the latest files for PL/SQL. I have been working with the powers that be

to get some new features in the base distribution, but in the meantime, you

can check here:

http://plnet.org/files/vim

At the moment, this is the site where I post my versions of the PL/SQL files.

There are actually two files, both named plsql.vim. One is a file for syntax

highlighting, and the other is for automatic indentation.

INSTALLING A NEW SYNTAX FILE

To install a new syntax file, just rename or delete the old one and copy the

new one into the "syntax" subdirectory of your vim installation (for example,

c:\apps\vim\vim61\syntax\plsql.vim, or /usr/share/vim/vim61/syntax/plsql.vim).

INSTALLING A NEW INDENT FILE AND GETTING VIM TO INDENT/UNINDENT YOUR PL/SQL

AUTOMATICALLY

Installing a new indent file is like installing a syntax file except you're

going to put it in the "indent" subdirectory. (for example,

c:\apps\vim\vimy61\indent/plsql.vim, or /usr/share/vim/vim61/indent/plsql.vim).

To get automatic PL/SQL indentation to work, though, you also have to run

the "indent" macro. One way to do this is edit you "vimrc" file and have it

run on vim startup. On Unix, this file is "$HOME/.vimrc" and on MS Windows it

is in your vim installation as something like "c:\apps\vim\_vimrc". Here is

what I put in my .vimrc file:

set et

set ts=3

set sw=3

set ai

runtime! indent.vim

This has some other goodies you will want. "set et" means that vim won't put

tab characters into your file, even if you hit the tab key. "set ts=3" means

that if you *do* hit the tab key, vim will insert three spaces. "set sw=3"

means that vim's indentation feature will use 3 spaces when indenting and

unindenting. "set ai" means that a given line of code should be default align

vertically with the line that precedes it. And finally "runtime! indent.vim"

means you want to run the "indent.vim" script which will get the automatic

indentation to work.

GETTING VIM TO RECOGNIZE YOUR SOURCE FILE AS PL/SQL

To get automatic PL/SQL syntax highlighting to work for all files of particular

file extensions, you will probably want to update the file named "filetype.vim"

once you get it installed. This file is in the root of your vim installation

(c:\apps\vim\vim61\filetype.vim or /usr/share/vim/vim61/filetype.vim). In my

file I changed the line for PL/SQL from this:

au BufNewFile,BufRead *.pls,*.plsql setf plsql

to this:

au BufNewFile,BufRead *.fun,*.pks,*.pkb,*.sql,*.pls,*.plsql setf plsql

...and I also commented out the definition line for SQL, because I want all

my SQL files to use the PL/SQL syntax definition.

Another way you can get vim to recognize a particular file as being PL/SQL is

to put a vim-specific comment in the file. Vim will read the comment and set

the features you request. For example, you might put the following at the

bottom of a source file:

-- vim: syntax=plsql

TESTING WHETHER IT IS WORKING

To test whether the indentation is working, bring up vim using a command such

as

vim test.plsql

and then (i)nsert into the buffer the following:

BEGIN

NULL;

foo;

END;

As you type, vim should reformat the program as follows:

BEGIN

NULL;

foo;

END;

The BEGIN/END should be in one color, NULL should be in another color, and

foo should be in a third color.

Enjoy!

--Bill Pribyl

http://www.datacraft.com

/*======================================================================

| Supplement to the fifth edition of Oracle PL/SQL Programming by Steven

| Feuerstein with Bill Pribyl, Copyright (c) 1997-2009 O'Reilly Media, Inc.

| To submit corrections or find more code samples visit

| http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780596514464/

*/