Vim --remote-silent always opens [No Name] buffer for first file

Question

I want to be able to open files using the same instance so I added --remote-silent when opening files. But the first time it loads, Vim will open an empty buffer, then my file. So now I have 2 buffers.

Upon further investigation, I noticed that setting nohidden will solve this problem. BUT, not only is it against my liking, it will cause the first buffer to have no syntax highlighting.

This doesn't happen without the --remote-silent option.

Any help appreciated. Thanks!

Answer 1

Doing $ vim --servername FOO --remote[-silent] filename without an instance already running launches a new instance first then opens the file: it is not like $vim filename. You have to find a way to completely remove the first empty buffer.

From my limited testing, adding set bufhidden=wipe to your ~/.vimrc may solve the problem.

set bufhidden=wipe, being local to a buffer, is applied only to the first empty buffer and reset afterwards.

See :h bufhidden.

This will certainly cause some problems when you run Vim normally, though.

edit

Yes, set bufhidden=wipe causes obvious problems. When launched "normally" (with $vim file1) the first buffer is wiped when you edit a second file which is not what you want.

A simple check on the name of the buffer resolves that problem:

if bufname('%') == ''
  set bufhidden=wipe
endif

Syntax highlighting works in every situation, here. Could you post the content of your ~/.vim/ and ~/.vimrc somewhere?