How do I customize zsh's vim mode?

Question

Ok, so I finally made the great change. In my .zshenv, I changed my EDITOR:

export EDITOR=vim

There are a couple of questions I have that are so minor that I didn't want to start separate questions for them. Here they are:

1. How do I get zsh to distinguish between insert mode and command mode like in vim? Preferably this would change the cursor from an underline to a block like in vim, but displaying text at the bottom would work as well.

2. How do I get it to act more like vim? For instance, I'd rather it be in command mode by default and not go out of it after one command.

Answer 1

1.) (see http://zshwiki.org/home/examples/zlewidgets and http://pthree.org/2009/03/28/add-vim-editing-mode-to-your-zsh-prompt/ ):

function zle-line-init zle-keymap-select {
    RPS1="${${KEYMAP/vicmd/-- NORMAL --}/(main|viins)/-- INSERT --}"
    RPS2=$RPS1
    zle reset-prompt
}
zle -N zle-line-init
zle -N zle-keymap-select

Where:

• "RPS" stands for 'right prompt string' and defines the prompt appearing on the right hand side of the terminal, and the ${variable/pattern/replacement} syntax is that of 'parameter expansion', see: http://mywiki.wooledge.org/BashSheet#Parameter_Operations.

• 'zle -N' causes the user-definable widgets 'zle-line-init' and 'zle-keymap-select' to be bound (to shell functions of same names), so that they will be called when the line editor is initialised and the keymap is changed respectively, see: http://zsh.sourceforge.net/Doc/Release/Zsh-Line-Editor.html#SEC125.

2.) i suspect that you have to write another zsh-widget to do that, get inspired by the first of the two links for the first problem.

Answer 2

zle-line-init() { zle -K vicmd; }
zle -N zle-line-init

these two lines make sure it starts in command mode