Changing directory from netrw does not call Rooter

[ckangnz]

I'm pretty sure this used to work previously as it has been my favourite way of navigating one project to another.

Say you have project folders like this and both Project_A and Project_B has .git so Rooter can find the root of the project.

~/code/Project_A/index.html ~/code/Project_B/index.html

When you are on index.html file on Project_A, and hit :pwd, I can confirm that it will returns ~/code/Project_A.

When I :Explore to go to netrw file view, and navigate to ~/code/Project_B without opening index.html, it used to pick up the root as it lands inside the directory. So even without having to open a file in Project_B, when I'm in the directory I could open fzf or telescope and navigate to my desired file from the new project.

TLDR;

./code
   |- Project_A
      |-.git
      |-index.html <----- 1. You're here. :pwd will say (~/Project_A)
   |- Project_B <-------2. Move to here via netrw then run :pwd. It still says (~/Project_A)
      |-.git
      |-index.html

1. Open Project_A/index.html. Hit :pwd. Confirm ~/code/Project_A
2. :Explore -> - to go to parent folder -> Enter Project_B

Actual : :pwd says ~/code/Project_A Expected : :pwd says ~/code/Project_B

[airblade]

I'm pretty sure this used to work previously

Any idea roughly how long ago?

[ckangnz]

@airblade i think at least a few weeks ago it used to work..? Back in August at least? I've been migrating vim->neovim and have been updating my plugins a bit often recently so can't exactly tell when it used to work

[ckangnz]

Also i have my .vimrc symlinked from .vim.

.vim/.vimrc symlinked to ~/.vimrc

When I open .vimrc, it used to pick up the git root of ~/.vim This isn't working anymore as well

[airblade]

When I open .vimrc, it used to pick up the git root of ~/.vim This isn't working anymore as well

Works for me. The test passes too.

Can you reproduce this when vim-rooter is your only plugin?

Also do you have any vim-rooter configuration?

[airblade]

i think at least a few weeks ago it used to work..? Back in August at least?

The last change to the plugin was in January. So something else has changed for you.

[ckangnz]

I just tested without any plugins but it still behaves the same.

My newest plugins i installed were telescope/ treesitter/ lualine as I was migrating from vim -> nvim. But funny enough, my vim is behaving exactly the same as nvim. I tried disabling all of the new plugins and it still doesn't fix the issue.

I might have added a few general settings but commenting them out still doesn't resolve the issue.

it's as if the Rooter() is not called automatically when i navigate to the folder. When I call it manually, it works fine. Either Rooter() is not called automatically, or something else is being called after to override it.

[ckangnz]

here's my rooter config

"---------VIM-ROOTER: airblade/vim-rooter
let g:rooter_silent_chdir = 1
let g:rooter_patterns = ['.git', 'package.json', '*.sln', 'appsettings.json']
let g:rooter_change_directory_for_non_project_files = 'current'

[ckangnz]

and here's an additional change i added in my autogroup

augroup LuaPath
  au!
  au BufRead,BufEnter * setlocal suffixesadd^=.lua
  au BufRead,BufEnter * setlocal suffixesadd^=init.lua
  au BufRead * let &l:path .= ','.stdpath('config').'/lua'
augroup END

This was added so that i could navigate to the lua file I wanted in require somefile.lua by gf

augroup autosourcing
  au!
  if exists('g:neovide') || has('nvim')
    au BufWritePost $HOME/.vimrc source $MYVIMRC
  endif
  au BufWritePost $MYVIMRC source $MYVIMRC
  au BufWritePost $HOME/.vim/.config/nvim/* source $MYVIMRC

  au BufNewFile,BufRead *.ejs set filetype=js
  au BufNewFile,BufRead *.vue,*.hbs set filetype=html
  au BufNewFile,BufRead *.jsx set filetype=javascriptreact
  au BufNewFile,BufRead *.tsx set filetype=typescriptreact

  au BufRead,InsertEnter * setlocal cursorline
  au VimEnter,InsertLeave * setlocal cursorline

  au BufRead * setlocal includeexpr=substitute(v:fname,'\\.','/','g') <--- This was added recently
augroup END

[airblade]

Maybe it's a change in Netrw. What vim and nvim versions are you using?

[airblade]

it's as if the Rooter() is not called automatically when i navigate to the folder. When I call it manually, it works fine. Either Rooter() is not called automatically, or ....

Rooter is called automatically on BufEnter:

https://github.com/airblade/vim-rooter/blob/4f52ca556a0b9e257bf920658714470ea0320b7a/plugin/rooter.vim#L67

The first thing it does is determine whether it should try to change the directory (or "activate"). When you are looking at a directory, with the default configuration, it will activate when the expanded filename is empty or ends in a /:

https://github.com/airblade/vim-rooter/blob/4f52ca556a0b9e257bf920658714470ea0320b7a/plugin/rooter.vim#L100

If it does, the code sets the buffer variable b:rootDir and then changes directory.

The next time Rooter runs in that buffer, it sees b:rootDir and just changes to that directory.

In your case my guesses are:

• either Netrw is not creating a new buffer for each directory navigation, so the code always sees and uses the b:rootDir set the first time;
• or Netrw sometimes sets the buffer's name to the directory path without a trailing slash, so the code doesn't think it is a directory but it also doesn't pass the filereadable() check.

I had a look at what changed in Netrw between 1 January 2023 and now. Unfortunately it was a lot; and Netrw is large and complicated; so I gave up trying to figure out whether a Netrw change is the culprit.

[ckangnz]

I currently use vim-vinegar (which i believe is same as Netrw). I've updated all vim/nvim all plugins to the latest version so something may have been updated.

My vim version is :

VIM - Vi IMproved 9.0 (2022 Jun 28, compiled Sep 02 2023 19:52:05)

and my neovim version is :

NVIM v0.9.2
Build type: Release
LuaJIT 2.1.0-beta3

I tried everything, restoring my git history as well but no luck. Whenever I change directory, I either have to hit ':Rooter' or ':Gcd' (tpope's fugitive command to cd into root directory).

At this point, I have to run ':Rooter' manually whenever I enter a directory via netrw. Otherwise I can just open any file in the project, which triggers :Rooter.

It would be nice to have this working again :(

[airblade]

I have done some digging and the problem occurs when the code determines the directory of the current buffer, in this case a netrw directory listing.

https://github.com/airblade/vim-rooter/blob/4f52ca556a0b9e257bf920658714470ea0320b7a/plugin/rooter.vim#L213

Surpisingly fn, the current filename / path, is empty. I would expect it to be the full path of the directory being listed by netrw.

Given that the buffer name is annoyingly empty, I thought instead that I could detect that we're in a netrw directory listing and then simply call getcwd(). But I can't figure out how to determine it's a netrw directory listing: the filetype has not been set – I would expect it to be "netrw" – and there are no netrw-related buffer variables.

I have asked on vi.stackexchange so hopefully a kind soul will help!

[ckangnz]

Thanks for looking into this @airblade . I'm assuming this isn't the edge case just for me because I just set up my environment completely new on another pc and i still have this issue. I mean.. i'm still using the same zsh/vim configuration though.

Is this also an issue after updating on your machine as well?

Thanks :)

[airblade]

It's not just you, netrw doesn't work with vim-rooter for me either. I don't use netrw so I never noticed before.

I use vim-dirvish which works perfectly with vim-rooter.

[airblade]

This fixes it for me:

let g:netrw_keepdir=0

From netrw's help:

  *g:netrw_keepdir*     =1 (default) keep current directory immune from
                   the browsing directory.
                =0 keep the current directory the same as the
                   browsing directory.
                The current browsing directory is contained in
                b:netrw_curdir (also see |netrw-cd|)

It seems that netrw always wants to control the working directory, regardless of what vim-rooter does. Once the directory listing has displayed, and after vim-rooter has run, netrw sets the working directory to either the original working directory (g:netrw_keepdir == 1) or the directory being listed (g:netrw_keepdir == 0).

Neither is quite right for us but the latter is better than the former. However it means that if you browse with netrw to a subdirectory of a root directory, netrw will set the working directory to that subdirectory.

Personally I find netrw annoying and much prefer other directory browsing plugins, none of which has this problem.

[ckangnz]

That's awesome!! It won't matter if netrw change directory to the subdirectory because when you open a file within the subdirectory, rooter will change the root. Thank you so much!!