Vim not recognizing aliases when in interactive mode?

Question

Same question as this, however the solution there didn't work.

I set these variables in my ~/.vimrc:

set shellcmdflag=-ic set shell=/bin/bash\ -i 

and I have an alias in my ~/.bash_aliases:

rgr() { if [ ! -z "$2" ]; then grep -rI --exclude=\*.svn\* "$1" * --include=$2 ; else grep -rI --exclude=*svn* "$1" * ; fi ; } 

which works when executed from the command line, but when I try to call it from Vim with :!rgr test, I get an error message and Vim exits:

bash: rgr: command not found  [4]+  Stopped                 vi ~/somefile 

If I disable the interactive mode, I just get the "command not found" message and Vim doesn't exit.

How can I get Vim to recognize my aliases? I've reproduced this behavior on both OS X and Ubuntu.

Answer 1

If you want non-interactive shell (as default) but expansion of bash aliases, put your alias definitions in a file, e.g. .bash_aliases and explicitly enable alias expansion in this file:

shopt -s expand_aliases alias la='ls -la' 

Then add this to your .vimrc so the aliases file is actually read each time you run a shell command from within vim:

let $BASH_ENV = "~/.bash_aliases" 

Answer 2

Try adding this line to your ~/.vimrc:

set shell=/bin/bash\ -i 

Then vim will use an interactive shell (-i) which reads from ~/.bashrc, by default. See :h shell for more information on shell.

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I see this is essentially the same as the previous answers that you say don't work. Please try the sample session below on your machine to see if you have similar results ( and post any errors / divergences from the output you see in the sample ).

$ cat .bash_aliases  alias test_alias="echo test alias" test_func () {         echo test func } $ vim  [vim]:set shell=/bin/bash [vim]:!type test_alias /bin/bash: line 0: type: test_alias: not found  shell returned 1  Press ENTER or type command to continue [vim]:!type test_func /bin/bash: line 0: type: test_func: not found  shell returned 1  Press ENTER or type command to continue [vim]:set shell=/bin/bash\ -i [vim]:!type test_alias test_alias is aliased to `echo test alias'  Press ENTER or type command to continue [vim]:!type test_func test_func is a function test_func ()  {      echo test func }  Press ENTER or type command to continue 

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As for why it wasn't working to begin with, when bash is simply run (i.e. neither interactive nor login; default for vim and most other purposes), it reads whatever file is specified in $BASH_ENV:

   When bash is started non-interactively, to  run  a  shell  script,  for    example, it looks for the variable BASH_ENV in the environment, expands    its value if it appears there, and uses the expanded value as the  name    of  a  file to read and execute.  Bash behaves as if the following com‐    mand were executed:           if [ -n "$BASH_ENV" ]; then . "$BASH_ENV"; fi    but the value of the PATH variable is not used to search for  the  file    name. 

By adding the -i, we make the shell interactive and it therefore it reads ~/.bashrc:

   When an interactive shell that is not a login shell  is  started,  bash    reads  and  executes  commands  from /etc/bash.bashrc and ~/.bashrc, if    these files exist.  This may be inhibited by using the  --norc  option.    The  --rcfile  file option will force bash to read and execute commands    from file instead of /etc/bash.bashrc and ~/.bashrc. 

The *profile files are read when starting a login shell:

   When  bash is invoked as an interactive login shell, or as a non-inter‐    active shell with the --login option, it first reads and executes  com‐    mands  from  the file /etc/profile, if that file exists.  After reading    that file, it looks for ~/.bash_profile, ~/.bash_login, and ~/.profile,    in  that order, and reads and executes commands from the first one that    exists and is readable.  The --noprofile option may be  used  when  the    shell is started to inhibit this behavior.