Well.. I'm writing this in nvim, as I'm updating my config to better align with the 0.12 release.. Or rather to better align with all the cool things that nvim has done lately like native lsp and vim.pack.

I started using nvim a few years back by simply jumping into the incredible nvim kickstart project that allowed me to have a somewhat stable base to start from.

Time went on and I built an environment for myself rather than using someone elses. But just like when working on any other project, if "keeping things up to date" is not a priority - you'll fall behind on it!

I haven't made any sweeping changes to my config even though nvim has! So, whats my plan here? I can't just wipe clean and start from nowhere - this is my interfacae to writing & reading code which is how I deliver quite a bit of value on a daily basis.

The plan...

The easy way here would be:

  • Update to 0.12

And ignore changes! 🎉 All done :) But we are not that simple, are we?

I'm basically going to have to switch back and forth between versions of neovim while I migrate my config.. Or at the very least run another version of nvim with another config so I can get some work done!

So what I did is to setup a temp version of nvim with 0 config (oh jeeesus what am I doing..) so that I can replicate my setup with a lot less tools that are now native.

  • Download & extract the tarball to /usr/local
  • Run nvim as another nvim app for easy and colissionfree conf handling: NVIM_APPNAME=nvim-next /usr/local/bin/nvim
  • Edit the config step by step at ~/.config/nvim-next/
  • Cry a bit over doing these things

The aftermath

I ended up with a whooping -1500 LOC change to my config while keeping the same functionality and even making it easier to follow what is going on.

Its a good day after all!

Out.