Refactoring in Vim

Question

Of course the fact that you can refactor on IDEs is priceless for many, I hardly ever do it when I am coding but I may try to do it when editing some one else\'s source. How do

Answer 1

Language Server Protocol (LSP)

The Language server protocol contains the feature for smart renaming of symbols across a project:

https://microsoft.github.io//language-server-protocol/specifications/specification-3-14/#textDocument_rename

For example following language server support this:

• Clangd for C++
• ccls for C/C++/Objective-C
• Eclipse.jdt.ls for Java
• pyls (with rope) for Python
• tsserver for TypeScript
• Solargraph for Ruby
• gopls official lsp for Go (alpha stage in Nov 2019)
• texlab for LaTeX

You can find more language servers under https://langserver.org/.

Vim

A vim editor client is necessary to use them within vim. Following options exist:

1. LanguageClient-neovim (requires rust) suggests the mapping:

    nnoremap <silent> <F2> :call LanguageClient_textDocument_rename()<CR>
   

2. coc.nvim (requires node.js) suggests the mapping:

    " Remap for rename current word
    nmap <leader>rn <Plug>(coc-rename)
   

3. Ale has

    nnoremap <silent> <Plug>(ale_rename) :ALERename<Return>
   

   Ale does not define any keybindings. This has to be done by the user.

4. vim-lsp provides following command

    :LspRename
   

   Similar to Ale no mapping is suggested. However, of course you can define one as following

    nmap <leader>r <plug>(lsp-rename)
   

   (<leader>r is to be replaced by your choice; I do not know one which most plugins agree on)

5. vim-lsc has a default mapping:

    'Rename': 'gR'
   

See also YouCompleteMe which facilitates LSPs as well.

Neovim

Neovim has initial builtin support for lsp since 13.11.2019

See for common configurations of LSPs https://github.com/neovim/nvim-lsp

However, I could not figure out how smart renaming works. If someone knows this, please update this section.

Other Refactorings

I do not know if there are plans for the LSP protocol to support more complex refactorings, such as changing class structure, adding parameters to methods/functions or moving a method to a different class. For a list of refactorings see https://refactoring.com/catalog/.

Answer 2

Python

For the python language following plugins provide 'smart' renaming capabilities for vim:

• jedi-vim (github) <leader>r
• ropevim (github) CTRL-c r r
• python-mode (github) :h pymode-rope-refactoring

Answer 3

I agree with the 'Vim is not an IDE' paradigm. But there are times when there isn't an IDE. Here's what I use in those situations:

:grep, :vimgrep, :Ag, :Ggrep

Refactoring that has more to do with regular replacements I usually use :grep on my project tree and then record a macro to do the refactor - :g and :s are no brainers. Usually it'll let me quickly modify a large number of files with very little effort. Honestly, I use this method more than any other.

Depending on your workflow the built-in commands might be slow/inconvenient. If you use git, then you'll wanna use the excellent Fugitive plugin and its :Ggrep command to only search files checked into git. I also like the Silver Searcher for its speediness.

:argdo, :cdo, and :bufdo

:cdo and :argdo are handy to execute vim commands over a set of files.

command line

When it's harder to determine the list of files that need changes via :vimgrep I resort to the command line grep/find commands to more closely curate the list of files that I need to refactor. Save the list to a text file and use :e and a mashup of macro recordings to make the changes I need to make.

I find that the less rusty I keep my macro recording skills the more useful I find Vim for refactoring: feeling comfortable saving/restoring from registers, incrementing/decrementing register counter variables, cleaning/saving macro recordings to file for later use, etc.

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Update

Since writing this more videocasts for the methods I describe have been published on vimcasts.org (I encourage you to watch ALL the Vimcasts!). For refactoring watch these ones:

• Substitution with :Subvert
• Project wide search/replace
• Search multiple files with :vimgrep
• Use :argdo to change multiple files

Vimgolf is also a great way to practice.

The ubiquity of Language Server Protocol servers since I wrote this answer have also brought some refactoring ability to Vim (and other editors). IMO they are a long way from the equaling the ability of refactoring capabilities you would see in a purpose-built IDE (I do use them, and prefer coc and ALE). See other answers on this question for more info!

Answer 4

For refactoring, if you're using Unite (and you should), you can then use vim-qfreplace and make it extremely easy. Check this video that demonstrates how it works. Once your workflow is set, you can make some mappings to optimize it (instead of typing most things like in the video).

Answer 5

Maybe not the most elegant solution, but I found it very handy: I use ECLIM to connect VIM and Eclipse. Of course all my source code editing is done in VIM, but when it's time to refactor, one can take advantage of Eclipse's superior cababilities in this matter.

Give it a try.

Answer 6

The CoC addon has (among other features) the ability to rename variables.

https://github.com/neoclide/coc.nvim

" Symbol renaming.
nmap <leader>rn <Plug>(coc-rename)