Using Evil for Good

:: linux, tricks

So I use Vim as my primary editor. Unfortunately, some applications I require (e.g. Proof General) run only on the Emacs operation system, which comes with a terrible editor. Thankfully, I’ve found a pretty decent port of Vim to Emacs, called (appropriately) Evil.

Setting up Evil is quite easy:

  1. Download the evil pacakge to ~/.emacs.d/evil:
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cd ~/.emacs.d/
git clone git://gitorious.org/evil/evil.git evil
  1. Next, add a few lines to your .emacs file:
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(add-to-list 'load-path "~/.emacs.d/evil/")
  (require 'evil)
(evil-mode 1)
  1. Now, customize. Evil doesn’t have ALL of Vim’s shortcuts by default. I’m not sure why. Here is what I added to .emacs for evil. It includes 2 other emacs plugins: evil-surround, which is a port of the vim surrounds plugin (necessary), and undo-tree, which provides fancy undo commands.
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    (add-to-list 'load-path "~/.emacs.d/evil/")
    (add-to-list 'load-path "~/.emacs.d/evil-surround/")
    (add-to-list 'load-path "~/.emacs.d/undo-tree")

    ;; Evil settings
    (setq evil-shift-width 2)
    (require 'evil)
    (evil-mode 1)
    (require 'surround)
    (global-surround-mode 1)

    (evil-ex-define-cmd "!" 'shell-command)
    ;;(evil-define-key 'normal proof-mode-map (kbd "M-v") 'proof-goto-point)
    (evil-define-key 'normal proof-mode-map (kbd "C-c RET") 'proof-goto-point)
    ;;; esc quits
    (define-key evil-normal-state-map [escape] 'keyboard-quit)
    (define-key evil-normal-state-map (kbd "C-u") 'keyboard-quit)
    (define-key evil-visual-state-map [escape] 'keyboard-quit)
    (define-key minibuffer-local-map [escape] 'minibuffer-keyboard-quit)
    (define-key minibuffer-local-ns-map [escape] 'minibuffer-keyboard-quit)
    (define-key minibuffer-local-completion-map [escape]
                'minibuffer-keyboard-quit)
    (define-key minibuffer-local-must-match-map [escape]
                'minibuffer-keyboard-quit)
    (define-key minibuffer-local-isearch-map [escape]
                'minibuffer-keyboard-quit)

    ;; Other things
    (define-key evil-normal-state-map "Y" 'copy-to-end-of-line)
    (global-set-key (kbd "RET") 'newline-and-indent)
    ;; coq
    (load-file "/usr/share/emacs/site-lisp/ProofGeneral/generic/proof-site.el")
    ;;(global-set-key (kbd "C-c RET") 'proof-goto-point)
    (evil-ex-define-cmd "[pr]prove" 'proof-goto-point)

Here’s a link to someone’s very large Evil configuration file.