[vim/vim] Is mapleader not supported in vim-tiny? (Discussion #19617)

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Andrei Heidelbacher

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Mar 8, 2026, 6:56:02 PMMar 8
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I've used vim-tiny (default Vim 9.1 version bundled on Debian and Ubuntu) on a couple of occasions and I was surprised that <leader> mappings don't work at all.

I cannot set mapleader using legacy Vimscript (e.g., let mapleader = "," or let g:mapleader = ",") because the +eval feature is missing, so the let statement is not available. Changing the leader with Vim9script syntax (g:mapleader = ",") doesn't throw an error, but it doesn't seem to have any effect either. This is documented, so no surprises here.

I can create leader mappings (e.g., nnoremap <leader>b <cmd>buffers<CR>), and I can see that they are configured correctly (:nmap <leader>b prints the correct mapping), but I cannot trigger them, neither with the custom leader (e.g., ,), nor with the default \, which is documented to be used as a fallback in case g:mapleader is empty or not set.

Since there's no way to change g:mapleader without +eval, leaving it empty, I would have expected Vim to fallback on the default \ leader, and for the leader mappings to work.

My questions:

  1. Are leader mappings not supported at all in vim-tiny?
  2. Since leader mappings are so ubiquitous, would it be feasible to support them even without the +eval feature, at least with the default \ leader?
  3. Building on top of the previous request, would it be feasible to provide some way of configuring a custom mapleader without the +eval feature?

Thanks!


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Christian Brabandt

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Mar 9, 2026, 3:02:54 AMMar 9
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I am afraid this is not supported for a minimum Vim feature set.


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Andrei Heidelbacher

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Mar 9, 2026, 4:21:38 AMMar 9
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I understand, thank you for confirming!


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dezza

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Mar 27, 2026, 1:18:02 PM (16 hours ago) Mar 27
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You can still map say nnoremap ,a :edit #<CR> similar to a common mapleader of , comma.


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