how to auto-enable/disable when entering/exiting visual mode

[hunleyd]

Is there a way to set up an autocmd (or something) to call HSHighlight when entering visual mode and then call HSRmHighlight when exiting visual mode? I have them mapped to F3/F4 as shown in the README but having 'the system' do it automatically would be even better.

[pocco81]

Hey! what exactly do you need? Calling HSHighlight as soon as you enter visual mode will only highlight the current character/thing you are over at the moment and calling HSRmHighlight will remove the highlights from the current line. That doesn't make sense.

Perhaps you meant to run HSHighlight after exiting visual mode in order to highlight what you selected? That's how the highlighter works in normal document editors.

[pocco81]

Nope, after searching for a while it concluded that it's not possible to do this:

• There are no events for leaving or entering visual modes
• There was a patch on vim to allow this but it doesn't seem to be available on NeoVim
• It is kind of possible to execute commands when entering visual mode, but simply adds another action to the v key for entering visual mode

I'd suggest you simply use a more "simple" mapping, like pressing h to highlight visual selection:

vnoremap <silent> h :<c-u>HSHighlight 1<CR>