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Barrett Ruth b7cbad7489 fix(tui): use erase_chars for short clears #38973
Problem:
Due to optimizations c936ae0f36, nvim prints literal spaces instead of using
`erase_chars` in widths <= 5 even if the terminal advertises `erase_chars`
support (perhaps a small-output size heuristic). However, this is not
semantically neutral: in some terminals, erased cells and printed spaces are
copied differently.

I ended up with two useful groups of results.

First, I tested raw terminal behavior without nvim involved:

    | Terminal | Raw plain text | Raw `erase_chars` | Raw literal spaces |
    | --- | --- | --- | --- |
    | xterm | clean | trailing spaces copied | trailing spaces copied |
    | xfce4-terminal | clean | clean | trailing spaces copied |

Second, I tested nvim itself:

    | Terminal | no patch | with this patch |
    | --- | --- | --- |
    | xfce4-terminal | trailing spaces reproduced | clean |
    | xterm | trailing spaces reproduced | trailing spaces reproduced |
    | Alacritty | clean | clean |
    | Ghostty | clean | clean |
    | WezTerm | clean | clean |

Nvim often prints spaces instead of sending `erase_chars`, which this patch
changes for short clears when the terminal advertises it. This fixes
xfce4-terminal because raw `erase_chars` are already cleaned up by the terminal,
while spaces aren't. ***Notably, xterm is different***: even when `erase_chars`
is sent directly (NO NVIM INVOLVED) xterm *still* copies those cleared blank
trailing cells (and this is documented). So for xterm, which is the only
remaining problematic fix, I'm quite sure there's nothing we ought to do on the
Nvim side.

Solution:
Drop the `width >= 5` condition.
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Neovim

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Neovim is a project that seeks to aggressively refactor Vim in order to:

See the Introduction wiki page and Roadmap for more information.

Features

See :help nvim-features for the full list, and :help news for noteworthy changes in the latest version!

Install from package

Pre-built packages for Windows, macOS, and Linux are found on the Releases page.

Managed packages are in Homebrew, Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora, Arch Linux, Void Linux, Gentoo, and more!

Install from source

See BUILD.md and supported platforms for details.

The build is CMake-based, but a Makefile is provided as a convenience. After installing the dependencies, run the following command.

make CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=RelWithDebInfo
sudo make install

To install to a non-default location:

make CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=RelWithDebInfo CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/full/path/
make install

CMake hints for inspecting the build:

  • cmake --build build --target help lists all build targets.
  • build/CMakeCache.txt (or cmake -LAH build/) contains the resolved values of all CMake variables.
  • build/compile_commands.json shows the full compiler invocations for each translation unit.

Transitioning from Vim

See :help nvim-from-vim for instructions.

Project layout

├─ cmake/           CMake utils
├─ cmake.config/    CMake defines
├─ cmake.deps/      subproject to fetch and build dependencies (optional)
├─ runtime/         plugins and docs
├─ src/nvim/        application source code (see src/nvim/README.md)
│  ├─ api/          API subsystem
│  ├─ eval/         Vimscript subsystem
│  ├─ event/        event-loop subsystem
│  ├─ generators/   code generation (pre-compilation)
│  ├─ lib/          generic data structures
│  ├─ lua/          Lua subsystem
│  ├─ msgpack_rpc/  RPC subsystem
│  ├─ os/           low-level platform code
│  └─ tui/          built-in UI
└─ test/            tests (see test/README.md)

License

Neovim contributions since b17d96 are licensed under the Apache 2.0 license, except for contributions copied from Vim (identified by the vim-patch token). See LICENSE.txt for details.

Description
Vim-fork focused on extensibility and usability
Readme 420 MiB
Languages
Vim Script 40.1%
Lua 32.1%
C 26.9%
CMake 0.4%
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