Config Explanation

Directory layout

.
├── after
│   ├── ftplugin
│   └── syntax
├── init.lua
├── lazy-lock.json
└── lua
    └── user
        ├── core
        │   ├── autocommands
        │   ├── config.lua
        │   ├── init.lua
        │   ├── keybindings.lua
        │   └── lazy.lua
        └── plugins
            ├── config
            │   ├── lspconfig.lua
            │   ├── lsps
            │   │   └── tinymist.lua
            │   ├── luasnip.lua
            │   ├── mason.lua
            │   ├── snacks
            │   │   ├── dashboard.lua
            │   │   └── snacks.lua
            │   └── treesitter.lua
            ├── conform.lua
            ├── friendlysnippets.lua
            ├── fzf-lua.lua
            ├── lspconfig.lua
            ├── luasnip.lua
            ├── mason.lua
            ├── oil.lua
            ├── rustacean.lua
            ├── snacks.lua
            ├── surround.lua
            └── treesitter.lua

Note

SOME FILES REMOVED BECAUSE THEY ARE REALLY SPECIFIC

Startup

The init.lua file is really short it only contains the following:

require "user.core"

It loads the lua/user/core directory (the lua directory can be ommitted because neovims lua interpreter considers it part of the project root), requiring a directory automatically executes the init.lua in that directory.

user.core.init.lua contains the following:

require("user.core.config")
require("user.core.keybindings")
require("user.core.autocommands.init")
require("user.core.lazy")

It loads the different "modules" in core.

Config

config sets some global vim options like the tab width, relative line numbers for easier vim motions and some other options. To get more information about each option use help topic (vim contains it's own documentation, it's really useful).

Keybindings

keybindings sets some convenient global keybindings I like. The map function is a local alias to vim.keymap.set

It sets [d and ]d to jump to the previous and next lsp diagnostic as well as <leader>gp and <leader>gn in order to go to the previous and next buffer.

Autocommands

autocommands are a bit advanced, they utilize builtin, or custom, Neovim events (see help events, help autocmd, as well as lua-autocommands) to automatically execute code upon some event. The most important one here the LspAttach auto command, it configures all lsp-related key binds, when a lsp attaches to a buffer the key binds are personal preference, you probably won't frequently using most of them, but they can be helpful once in a while.

Note

Some of the key-binds use alternatives provided by other plugins

Plugins

lazy bootstraps the lazy.nvim plugin manager. We combine the various tables to make the configuration easier to read. The main thing to notice is that we set opts.default.lazy to true this makes all plugins lazy by default, meaning they won't be loaded unless some event is fired. These can be builtin events or events defined by lazy.

Plugin Spec

Lazy expects the files in spec.import to return a table following the lazy plugin spec. That's what each file in lua/user/plugins does, it returns a table, as an example lets look at lua.user.plugins.blink as an example:

return {
    "saghen/blink.cmp",
    version = "*",
    opts = require "user.plugins.config.blink",
    event = "InsertEnter",
    dependencies = {
        "saghen/blink.compat"
    },
}

It installs the blink.cmp plugin, which adds autocompletion to my Neovim, there are alternatives but none as good as blink, in my opinion. We tell it to use any version of the plugin using version = "*". The InsertEnter event is set to load the plugin, so it loads the first time I enter insert mode. I add the saghen/blink.compat plugin as a dependency, as some of my plugins do not yet fully support blink, as it is a relatively new plugin. The dependency is loaded before the actual plugin. The opts field delivers arguments to the function which starts the plugin (usually require("insert_plugin_module).setup(opts)), the options are usually documented either in a plugins documentation or readme, sometimes they also provide a Vimdoc help file.

For plugins that require more than a few options I prefer configure them in an external file, I do this by creating a file with the same name as the plugin in user.plugins.config.

Important plugins

• nvim-lspconfig provides default configurations for almost every language server you can think of.
• blink.cmp adds inline autocompletion, it provides several mapping styles, see keymap-presets
• nvim-treesitter adds beautiful highlighting to neovim using treesitter
• mason.nvim a lsp-package-manager, allows you to easily install lsps (I prefer to actually install lsps locally, but I find it very convenient to discover new lsps using mason)
  • mason-lspconfig bridges mason and lspconfig (I think I could theoretically ditch it)

Very cool plugins I recommend

• oil.nvim allows you to edit your filesystem as if it were a neovim-buffer
• fzf-lua a fuzzy finder using fzf as a backend, I used to use telescope, but find fzf to be more modular
• conform.nvim allows you to configure formatters
• rustaceanvim more functionality from rust analyzer
• trouble.nvim lsp info in a popup window (I only use diagnostics usually)
• snacks.nvim Lot's of snacks, (I use it for dashboard and notify, and have everything else disabled, there's a lot of functionality though)
• LuaSnip snippets for neovim
• mini 40 lua modules to use in your neovim config
  • mini.surround: Helix like surround capabilities
  • mini.pairs: auto pairs parentheses, brackets and whatever you want it to