Cleanup your HTML

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created 2001 · complexity advanced · author scrott · version 5.7

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Easy Steps for Beginners (windows)

Download and install html tidy
Add this to your vimrc:
" HTML Tidy, http://tidy.sourceforge.net/
" select xml text to format and hit ,x
vmap ,x :!tidy -q -i -xml<CR>

Restart vim, open the html file, select all (or just a region)
When the text is selected, type the following (<ENTER> = Hit the Enter key} ,x<ENTER>
HTML should be formatted

You can use Vim's makeprg and equalprg to clean up HTML. First download html tidy, then use the following commands.

For vim6 or higher:

exe 'setlocal equalprg=tidy\ -quiet\ -f\ '.&errorfile
setlocal makeprg=tidy\ -quiet\ -e\ %

For vim5:

exe 'set equalprg=tidy\ -quiet\ -f\ '.&errorfile
set makeprg=tidy\ -quiet\ -e\ %

At this point you can use make to clean up the full file or you can use = to clean up sections.

References

• :help =
• :help 'equalprg'
• :help 'makeprg'

Comments

There is also Jtidy (Java implementation of tidy).

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Vim 6.0 comes with a Tidy compiler plugin for use in quickfix mode - $VIMRUNTIME/compiler/tidy.vim

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To use the included compiler script, run :compiler tidy. For more info, see :help quickfix and :help compiler-select.

If you are using tidy.vim under Windows, you need to set your shellpipe=2> or else Vim won't see the output from tidy. Apparently these Unix tools write output to stderr instead of stdout and Vim isn't configured by default to handle this situation.

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just start with vim using 6.2 (mandrake 10 .rpm) need add backslashes like in the tidy.vim file don't know but for me works just with the command:

:setlocal makeprg=tidy\ -quiet\ -m\ -utf8\ %

and then:

:make

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vim 6.3 indents html very well when I put the line

filetype plugin indent on

into my personal ~/.vimrc (or ~\_vimrc) file. I also think that html-tidy is not able to indent only parts of a HTML file. Therefore, I do not use it as equalprg.

I use html-tidy only in order to check if my HTML document is well formed. Therefore, I create a ~/.vim/after/ftplugin/html.vim (or ~\vimfiles\after\ftplugin\html.vim or an html.vim placed in the directory that appears last when typing :set runtimepath?) and put into it (among other things) the lines:

setlocal makeprg=tidy\ -quiet\ -errors\ %
setlocal errorformat=line\ %l\ column\ %v\ -\ %m

I have found that the errorformat option must be adapted as shown in order to be able jump through the error list by means of :cn and :cp etc.

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Tidy can be used for just a portion of the document by using the --show-body-only flag. For instance, on using vim6 on OSX the above command could be rewritten as:

:exe 'setlocal equalprg=tidy\ -quiet\ -i\ --show-body-only\ true\ -f\ '.&errorfile

the -i indents, that is optional

The rest of the tidy options can be found here: http://tidy.sourceforge.net/docs/quickref.html

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Call a function for tidy - add to your vimrc

command Td :call Tidy()
function Tidy()
  let filename=expand("%:p") " escapes for bash
  let filename=substitute(filename, " ", "\\\\ ", "g")
  let filename=substitute(filename, "(", "\\\\(", "g")
  let filename=substitute(filename, ")", "\\\\)", "g")
  let filename=substitute(filename, "[", "\\\\[", "g")
  let filename=substitute(filename, "]", "\\\\]", "g")
  let filename=substitute(filename, "&", "\\\\&", "g")
  let filename=substitute(filename, "!", "\\\\!", "g")
  let filename=substitute(filename, ",", "\\\\,", "g")
  let filename=substitute(filename, "'", "?", "g")
  let filename2=substitute(filename, ".*", "&.tidy.htm", "")
  let filename3=substitute(filename, ".*", "&.errors.tidy.txt", "")
  execute "!tidy "."-f ".filename3." ".filename." > ".filename2.""
endfunction

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Here is a mapping so Vim calls Tidy when pressing F12. Advantage of this solution: you can undo changes very easily. Put this in your vimrc:

map <F12> :%!tidy -q --tidy-mark 0 2>/dev/null<CR>

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I use this:

command Txml set ft=xml | execute "%!tidy -q -i -xml"
command Thtml set ft=html | execute "%!tidy -q -i -html"

You can undo the formatting, but the ft change won't be undone.

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