Installation
We provide pre-built binaries on the GitHub Releases page.
OSX
TODO: brew tap
Please use a pre-built binary release for the time being.
Linux
NixOS
A flake containing the package is available in the project root. The flake can also be used to spin up a reproducible development shell for working on Helix.
Arch Linux
Binary packages are available on AUR:
Build from source
git clone --recurse-submodules --shallow-submodules -j8 https://github.com/helix-editor/helix
cd helix
cargo install --path helix-term
This will install the hx
binary to $HOME/.cargo/bin
.
Now copy the runtime/
directory somewhere. Helix will by default look for the
runtime inside the same folder as the executable, but that can be overriden via
the HELIX_RUNTIME
environment variable.
If you want to embed the runtime/
directory into the Helix binary you can build
it with:
cargo install --path helix-term --features "embed_runtime"
Usage
Configuration
Theme
Use a custom theme by placing a theme.toml in your config directory (i.e ~/.config/helix/theme.toml). The default theme.toml can be found here, and user submitted themes here.
Styles in theme.toml are specified of in the form:
key = { fg = "#ffffff", bg = "#000000", modifiers = ["bold", "italic"] }
where name
represents what you want to style, fg
specifies the foreground color, bg
the background color, and modifiers
is a list of style modifiers. bg
and modifiers
can be omitted to defer to the defaults.
To specify only the foreground color:
key = "#ffffff"
if the key contains a dot '.'
, it must be quoted to prevent it being parsed as a dotted key.
"key.key" = "#ffffff"
Possible modifiers:
modifier |
---|
bold |
dim |
italic |
underlined |
slow_blink |
rapid_blink |
reversed |
hidden |
crossed_out |
Possible keys:
key | notes |
---|---|
attribute | |
keyword | |
keyword.directive | preprocessor directives (#if in C) |
namespace | |
punctuation | |
punctuation.delimiter | |
operator | |
special | |
property | |
variable | |
variable.parameter | |
type | |
type.builtin | |
constructor | |
function | |
function.macro | |
function.builtin | |
comment | |
variable.builtin | |
constant | |
constant.builtin | |
string | |
number | |
escape | escaped characters |
label | used for lifetimes |
module | |
ui.background | |
ui.linenr | |
ui.statusline | |
ui.popup | |
ui.window | |
ui.help | |
ui.text | |
ui.text.focus | |
ui.menu.selected | |
warning | LSP warning |
error | LSP error |
info | LSP info |
hint | LSP hint |
These keys match tree-sitter scopes. We half-follow the common scopes from macromates language grammars with some differences.
For a given highlight produced, styling will be determined based on the longest matching theme key. So it's enough to provide function to highlight function.macro
and function.builtin
as well, but you can use more specific scopes to highlight specific cases differently.
Keymap
Normal mode
Movement
Key | Description |
---|---|
h, Left | move left |
j, Down | move down |
k, Up | move up |
l, Right | move right |
w | move next word start |
b | move previous word start |
e | move next word end |
t | find 'till next char |
f | find next char |
T | find 'till previous char |
F | find previous char |
Home | move to the start of the line |
End | move to the end of the line |
m | Jump to matching bracket |
PageUp | Move page up |
PageDown | Move page down |
ctrl-u | Move half page up |
ctrl-d | Move half page down |
ctrl-i | Jump forward on the jumplist TODO: conflicts tab |
ctrl-o | Jump backward on the jumplist |
v | Enter select (extend) mode |
g | Enter goto mode |
: | Enter command mode |
z | Enter view mode |
ctrl-w | Enter window mode (maybe will be remove for spc w w later) |
space | Enter space mode |
K | Show documentation for the item under the cursor |
Changes
Key | Description |
---|---|
r | replace with a character |
R | replace with yanked text |
i | Insert before selection |
a | Insert after selection (append) |
I | Insert at the start of the line |
A | Insert at the end of the line |
o | Open new line below selection |
o | Open new line above selection |
u | Undo change |
U | Redo change |
y | Yank selection |
p | Paste after selection |
P | Paste before selection |
> | Indent selection |
< | Unindent selection |
= | Format selection |
d | Delete selection |
c | Change selection (delete and enter insert mode) |
Selection manipulation
Key | Description |
---|---|
s | Select all regex matches inside selections |
S | Split selection into subselections on regex matches |
alt-s | Split selection on newlines |
; | Collapse selection onto a single cursor |
alt-; | Flip selection cursor and anchor |
% | Select entire file |
x | Select current line |
X | Extend to next line |
[ | Expand selection to parent syntax node TODO: pick a key |
J | join lines inside selection |
K | keep selections matching the regex TODO: overlapped by hover help |
space | keep only the primary selection TODO: overlapped by space mode |
ctrl-c | Comment/uncomment the selections |
Search
TODO: The search implementation isn't ideal yet -- we don't support searching in reverse, or searching via smartcase.
Key | Description |
---|---|
/ | Search for regex pattern |
n | Select next search match |
N | Add next search match to selection |
* | Use current selection as the search pattern |
Diagnostics
NOTE:
[
and]
will likely contain more pair mappings in the style of vim-unimpaired
Key | Description |
---|---|
[d | Go to previous diagnostic |
]d | Go to next diagnostic |
[D | Go to first diagnostic in document |
]D | Go to last diagnostic in document |
Select / extend mode
I'm still pondering whether to keep this mode or not. It changes movement commands to extend the existing selection instead of replacing it.
NOTE: It's a bit confusing at the moment because extend hasn't been implemented for all movement commands yet.
View mode
View mode is intended for scrolling and manipulating the view without changing the selection.
Key | Description |
---|---|
z , c | Vertically center the line |
t | Align the line to the top of the screen |
b | Align the line to the bottom of the screen |
m | Align the line to the middle of the screen (horizontally) |
j | Scroll the view downwards |
k | Scroll the view upwards |
Goto mode
Jumps to various locations.
NOTE: Some of these features are only available with the LSP present.
Key | Description |
---|---|
g | Go to the start of the file |
e | Go to the end of the file |
h | Go to the start of the line |
l | Go to the end of the line |
s | Go to first non-whitespace character of the line |
t | Go to the top of the screen |
m | Go to the middle of the screen |
b | Go to the bottom of the screen |
d | Go to definition |
y | Go to type definition |
r | Go to references |
i | Go to implementation |
a | Go to the last accessed/alternate file |
Object mode
TODO: Mappings for selecting syntax nodes (a superset of [
).
Window mode
This layer is similar to vim keybindings as kakoune does not support window.
Key | Description |
---|---|
w, ctrl-w | Switch to next window |
v, ctrl-v | Vertical right split |
h, ctrl-h | Horizontal bottom split |
q, ctrl-q | Close current window |
Space mode
This layer is a kludge of mappings I had under leader key in neovim.
Key | Description |
---|---|
f | Open file picker |
b | Open buffer picker |
s | Open symbol picker (current document) |
w | Enter window mode |
space | Keep primary selection TODO: it's here because space mode replaced it |