Switching from NERDTree to Fern for a Vim Tree View Plugin
In this video we'll go over how I use Fern to view and manipulate files in Vim. It's extremely fast and supports marking multiple files.
Quick Jump: Demo Video of Using and Configuring Fern
A while back I made a video on why I use NERDTree and all of those reasons still apply for Fern too. It’s just Fern happens to be much faster and it has a couple of features that are amazing, like being able to mark multiple files and bulk rename files using a Vim buffer.
This video covers a bunch of common features of Fern and how to install / configure it.
Demo Video of Using and Configuring Fern
Timestamps
- 0:09 – I mainly switched from NERDTree to Fern because Fern is faster
- 2:22 – Renaming and moving files is very nice with Fern
- 4:25 – Performing bulk renames using a Vim buffer after marking files with Fern
- 6:22 – Taking a look at installing and configuring Fern
- 8:08 – Going over a couple of custom mappings (such as toggling Fern)
- 8:34 – The
new-pathmapping lets you create a file or directory like NERDTree does - 10:10 – Toggling hidden files on and off
- 10:16 – Reloading Fern so it’s in sync with your file system
- 10:49 – Marking and unmarking to perform bulk actions
- 10:58 – Using drawer mode to ensure Fern always stays open
- 11:21 – Opening files in specific Vim splits using Fern’s letter label system
- 13:59 – Changing the root node to move it up or down your file system
- 14:25 – Checking out Fern’s help menu and running actions without mappings
- 15:26 – Finding out about Fern from a blog post (yay for the internet)
Reference Links
- https://nickjanetakis.com/blog/i-use-nerdtree-in-vim-but-it-is-usually-not-for-opening-files
- https://github.com/lambdalisue/fern.vim
- https://github.com/nickjj/dotfiles/blob/0c8abec8c433f7e7394cc2de4a060f3e8e00beb9/.vimrc#L444-L499
- https://bluz71.github.io/2017/05/21/vim-plugins-i-like.html#fernvim
Are you going to switch to fern or are you already using it? Let me know below.