Using your vim on different xterms with colors

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created 2006 · complexity intermediate · author Klaus Ethgen · version n/a

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I use Vim always in the console and I love to have coloured syntax highlighting. But I also work on several Linux distributions where some have xterm with 16 colours, and others with 256.

So I use the following in my vimrc:

let g:rhrel = -1
if filereadable("/etc/redhat-release")
  let g:rhrel = 0
  if version >= 700
    for line in readfile("/etc/redhat-release", '', 1)
      if line =~ '\Crelease [0-9.]\+'
        let g:rhrel = substitute(matchstr(line, 'release [0-9.]\+'), 'release ', "", "")
      endif
    endfor
  endif
endif
if &term == "xterm"
  if g:rhrel >= 0 && g:rhrel < 5
    set t_Co=16
    colors white
  else
    set t_Co=256
    colors morning
  endif
  "colors gor
else
  set t_Co=8 " Ist eh default
endif

I just searched for useful colour schemes for 8, 16 and 256 colors in the console. The most are not useful as they do often end with, for example, red foreground on red background or such. But this is another problem.

Comments

You ought to make it simple: In vimrc: if $TERM =~ /xterm_color256/
and set TERM in your bashrc: export TERM=xterm_color256

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