Disable vim automatic visual mode using mouse

Submitted by fabio on Thu, 2007-07-12 11:41.

I usually use Vim for command line text file editing.

Some days ago, probably due to a change in /etc/vimrc after a system update, the behavior of the mouse changed.

Selecting some text with the mouse automatically enter visual mode. I rarely use the visual feature and when I use it I prefer using the v keyboard command.

I found this new setting pretty annoying. So I decided to disable it.

If you also want do the same you can:

  1. issue the command :set mouse-=a
  2. insert the directive set mouse-=a into your ~/.vimrc file

Very thanks

Submitted by Valtoni Boaventura (not verified) on Mon, 2009-11-30 19:43.

It's very wonderful.
I don't see this answer in vim docs. Thanks again!

Thanks! I have no idea why

Submitted by James (not verified) on Mon, 2009-11-23 17:40.

Thanks! I have no idea why anybody would want a mouse in vim. That's a stupid feature. If you're using the mouse, you probably want to copy something OUT of the terminal, like text into a browser.
Anyway, thanks.

thanks a million

Submitted by ben (not verified) on Fri, 2009-11-20 14:28.

I wonder what happened to my putty software. I normally use the mouse right click to copy text into vi within putty. I stopped working oneday when there was a system update.

Now things back to normal. Visual mode is a bit confusing and I never used it anyway.

gnome-terminal

Submitted by R. Henze (not verified) on Thu, 2009-10-22 11:37.

Thank you very much! This was really annoying.
I assumed that this is a case of gnome-terminal.
So it took a while till I found your blog.
Best regards
R. Henze

Vim is not compiled with this enabled, except for gvim

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu, 2009-10-15 21:03.

If you're seeing this effect in Putty, that means your sysadmin put it into the global vimrc file. If you build vim from source on your own machine, which doesn't already have a global vimrc file, you shouldn't this effect when you login to SSH using putty.

simple alternative solution

Submitted by Paweł (not verified) on Wed, 2009-10-07 12:32.

There's no need to disable this feature. Just hold shift while selecting text.

thank you

Submitted by slacki (not verified) on Tue, 2009-08-11 15:35.

hi,
thank you for this information,
this fix my problems and i can now working
with (g)vi(m).

Reply

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat, 2009-07-25 21:24.

It happened when I tried to write a code to add an action and enabled my module for the 1st time

I cannot see any connection between this and my code I actually just contained empty functions and hooks

This is not the 1st time I got this, last time I recovered from my nightly backup and lost the accesslog, watchdog and some cache I am not backing up nightly

I think this is a critical issue, I'll do my best to investigate it anyway your tip saved me! 10x!

Florida Permit Test

That is anoying

Submitted by JO (not verified) on Sat, 2009-05-23 18:47.

I hardly came across something more annoying as "visual" edit mode in VIM. I'm using putty a lot and the left mouse button is to paste text, not to enter "visual" mode, thank you very much.

If I want a "visual" editor vi, or vim, is the last thing I think about.

adding set mouse-=a to a file called ~/vimrc didn't change a thing. vim insisted on "visual" mode.

Please give me back vi

The file is called ~/.vimrc

Submitted by fabio on Sun, 2009-05-24 08:57.

The file is called ~/.vimrc - Note the dot: without it, it won't work.

THAT drives me insane!!! I

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Wed, 2009-03-25 20:16.

THAT drives me insane!!! I hate to say this but that one that decided to do this as default setting should ___ right NOW!!!!

Thanks A LOT for this hint!

EDIT: removed offensive words

you shouldn't say that to

Submitted by fabio on Wed, 2009-03-25 20:51.

you shouldn't say that to anyone.

Thankyou thankyou ...the

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue, 2009-03-24 12:18.

Thankyou thankyou ...the mouse feature was annoying me .... now i am happy

thank you, thank you thank

Submitted by marsh (not verified) on Thu, 2009-03-12 00:51.

thank you, thank you thank you ;)

this was annoying the crap out of me...

Thanks so much!

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Wed, 2009-02-25 06:04.

I had resorted to head|tail file everytime I had to copy it over because of this annoying auto visual feature. Thanks for this setting and note!

hey, thanks for that. I

Submitted by icebird (not verified) on Fri, 2009-02-20 10:32.

hey, thanks for that. I wonder what they were thinking.

Thanks for the fix!

Submitted by Jason (not verified) on Fri, 2009-02-13 04:10.

This has been killing me too. Now if I can only find an app that will let me cat files to the clipboard. BTW it looks like you're using Drupal for you website. Drupal rocks!

I'm glad i wasn't the only

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue, 2009-01-06 17:14.

I'm glad i wasn't the only one going nuts.. thanks!

Oh my god THANKS

Submitted by Dam (not verified) on Thu, 2008-12-11 10:40.

Was driving me crazy, I knew something was up with my .vimrc because renaming it would restore the old behaviour, but jeez...

This was a horribad feature, leave my mouse alone >.<

thankyou very much!

Submitted by lll9p (not verified) on Wed, 2008-11-05 17:39.

it fixs haha

THANKS !!!

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 2008-07-21 15:51.

Now that I control my mouse, i can work again.

thank you

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue, 2008-07-15 18:25.

Aaargh. Another source of frustration conquered. Thank you. My wheel continues to work, too. Yay!

yes, that visual mouse was

Submitted by iv (not verified) on Tue, 2008-06-03 15:43.

yes, that visual mouse was highly irritating. thanks for the post.

good point with old dogs :)

thanks, tip was really

Submitted by sundeep (not verified) on Fri, 2008-03-28 09:10.

thanks, tip was really helpful.
i was trying to copy the name of function from the vim editor into gbd window. Was unsuccessful till now :)

Oh dear, THANK YOU!

Submitted by jiki (not verified) on Tue, 2007-11-06 21:38.

It was driving me crazy too, I thought at first that there was sth wrong with my laptop.

Looks like vim people can't teach old dogs new tricks:)

cheers

I too had this problem.

Submitted by Jobias (not verified) on Fri, 2007-09-14 21:09.

I too had this problem. However, one thing I now miss about vim is that the mouse wheel no longer works. It seems as if setting mouse=a instead of mouse-=a, while producing the annoying auto-visual mode behavior, also enables the mouse wheel. Ah well, the trade-offs are worth it.

thank you for posting this

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 2007-08-03 15:14.

thank you for posting this fix. This problem has been driving me nuts

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