Initial empty buffer not reused.

[PhilRunninger]

Here is a comparison of two similar workflows, first without Vifm, and then with.

bash$  ls > foo.txt
bash$ vim
:edit foo.txt

At this point, foo.txt is the only buffer in vim, having reused the buffer number of the default empty buffer.

bash$  ls > foo.txt
bash$ vim
:EditVifm
<select foo.txt>

Using this workflow, I end up with two buffers: the initial empty buffer and foo.txt.

I prefer the first behavior, but while using vifm as the file picker. Am I doing something wrong, is there a vim setting I need to change, or is this a bug?

Thanks, Phil

[xaizek]

For :EditVifm just calls :args <list of files, which should give the behaviour you expect. Maybe you're using old version of the plugin?

[PhilRunninger]

Yes, I'm using the latest commit. I think there's some confusion here; maybe I chose my words poorly before. I would like the empty buffer to be replaced by the first (or any) file I select using vifm. I think the :args statement is causing the behavior I'm seeing. If I just open vim and issue the command :args foo.txt, I still have the empty buffer. However, when I start vim and use :edit foo.txt, the empty buffer is replaced.

After looking at the code, I made the changes shown here, and it behaves as I was expecting it to. Are these changes compatible with your design?

1. Delete lines 163-167. This lets lines 170-178 process the list with the edit command.
2. Change drop to silent! drop in line 180. This prevents the error messages from the drop command. Per the vim documentation, :drop is {only available when compiled with a GUI}. Another option is to use

   if has("drop")
     execute 'drop' firstfile
   else
     execute 'buffer' fnamemodify(firstfile, ':.')
   endif

[xaizek]

OK, I misunderstood the issue.

Delete lines 163-167. This lets lines 170-178 process the list with the edit command.

And will probably break opening multiple files at the same time.

:drop is {only available when compiled with a GUI}

Thanks, didn't know that.

There used to be this piece:

    if len(flist) == 1
        execute a:editcmd flist[0]
        return
    endif

But I removed it because :args handles this case as well. It can be returned, but it doesn't help when opening multiple files and I'm not sure I want to close such buffers explicitly as it might cause some side effects.

[PhilRunninger]

My changes do work with multiple files, and they remove what I see as an inconsistency - :EditVifm (using :args) leaves the empty empty buffer there, while :SplitVifm and :VsplitVifm (using :edit) do not.

[xaizek]

Right, it's just that argument list isn't populated, but we can do this manually without using :args.