# Ruvi, Vim, Ruby

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ruvi-vim-ruby/119169>\
**Category:** Ruby\
**Created:** [November 4, 2007, 7:34am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ruvi-vim-ruby/119169 "2007-11-04T07:34:54Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![redroofgreentree](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/b9bd4f/32.png) [@redroofgreentree](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/redroofgreentree)\
**Post date:** [November 4, 2007, 7:34am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ruvi-vim-ruby/119169/1 "2007-11-04T07:34:54Z")

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Hi!

Is Ruvi ([http://ruvi.rubyforge.org/](http://ruvi.rubyforge.org/)) still active? If not, is there  
any  
interest in re-implementing a subset of VIM in ruby?

Advantages of this would be:  
(1) Make VIM more hackable.  
(A) I do not have the talent to understand the C portions of the VIM  
code  
(B) I don’t like the vimscript language very much  
(2) Make the VIM-script langauge Ruby. More hackable. (I.e 1)  
(3) Easier to integrate with ruby-debug / irb  
(4) Make VIM better at editing Ruby code then Emacs. (I love VIM; but  
almost  
tempted to switch.)

Thanks!

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**Author:** ![redroofgreentree](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/b9bd4f/32.png) [@redroofgreentree](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/redroofgreentree)\
**Post date:** [November 4, 2007, 7:38am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ruvi-vim-ruby/119169/2 "2007-11-04T07:38:24Z")

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Oh, I forgot one really important thing – use Ruby to parse Ruby; to  
automatically get identing right for free

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**Author:** ![redroofgreentree](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/b9bd4f/32.png) [@redroofgreentree](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/redroofgreentree)\
**Post date:** [November 4, 2007, 10:31am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ruvi-vim-ruby/119169/3 "2007-11-04T10:31:53Z")

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On Nov 4, 2007 7:37 AM, redroofgreentree [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)  
wrote:

> > Thanks!

Appealing ideas, I have no idea about ruvi though.

Robert

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![redroofgreentree](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/b9bd4f/32.png) [@redroofgreentree](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/redroofgreentree)\
**Post date:** [November 6, 2007, 11:03pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ruvi-vim-ruby/119169/4 "2007-11-06T23:03:58Z")

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redroofgreentree wrote:

> (4) Make VIM better at editing Ruby code then Emacs. (I love VIM; but almost  
> tempted to switch.)

As far as I know it is already possible to use Ruby (and also at least  
Python and (Mz)Scheme) language for writing Vim plugins.  
rubycomplete.vim from [http://vim-ruby.rubyforge.org/](http://vim-ruby.rubyforge.org/) utilizes this  
feature.

I do not know how far the current integration with Ruby goes, but may be  
it’s usable enough (for e.g. writing ruby-debug-vim extension). If not I  
think that all the effort should be put into polishing the current  
integration - writing Vim plugins in Ruby (and/or other languages in  
General). Perfect Vim-Ruby integration would solve all problems you  
mentioned, I believe.

Rewriting whole Vim into Ruby seems to be overkill to me. Probably  
impossible task 🙂 On the other hand there are some clones written from  
scratch, like viPlugin for Eclipse, jVi (NB plugin utilizes that AFAIK).  
I’ve spend some time on Eclipse plugin in the past and it was fun and  
there are a lot of Rubyists who could join something like Ruvi. So might  
be it’s not that crazy idea 🙂 Actually I should probably try the Ruvi  
(Activity Percentile: 83.31%)

> (3) Easier to integrate with ruby-debug / irb

If you would start this let me know. That was actually one of the goal  
of debug-commons project ([http://debug-commons.rubyforge.org/](http://debug-commons.rubyforge.org/)) - or  
rather my secret wish… only if I have more time.

Vim forever! 😉

m.