Overriding Default Vim-test Strategies

on vim 1 minute read

vim-test can help you to turn a process of running tests into pleasure. It has multiple strategies for tests execution: basic, dispatch, tmux, neovim terminal, etc. Each strategy is hardcoded inside vim-test/autoload/test/strategy.vim, but we can easily override any of them.

If you are using neovim, then you probably want to take full advantage of its embedded terminal. By default neovim strategy for test execution will open new terminal buffer with command enew and start insert mode.

function! test#strategy#neovim(cmd) abort
  enew | call termopen(a:cmd) | startinsert
endfunction

However, it takes over the active split and, upon test completion, the terminal and the split get closed (issue #25):

asciicast

To override this strategy we need to move test#strategy#neovim function into .vimrc (.nvimrc) and place it right after the end of plugins initialization:

I use vim-plug and override neovim strategy for opening new horizontal split with terminal:

...
call plug#end() " plugins initialization finished

" Custom neovim strategy for vim-test
function! test#strategy#neovim(cmd) abort
  botright new | call termopen(a:cmd) | startinsert
endfunction

When ! is used inside function! definition then an existing function will be silently replaced.

That's how overrided strategy works:

asciicast

Any strategy from vim-test/autoload/test/strategy.vim can be overrided this way.

Update 2015-08-10

Vim-test now supports custom strategies. Example above can be rewritten like this:

function! SplitStrategy(cmd)
  botright new | call termopen(a:cmd) | startinsert
endfunction
let g:test#custom_strategies = {'terminal_split': function('SplitStrategy')}
let g:test#strategy = 'terminal_split'