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As said in the title I am unable to copy from vim to system clipboard. Viceversa works, copying from outside vim and pasting with p is ok.

I have installed clipboard support, vim version is 7.3.429:

$ vim --version | grep clip
+clientserver +clipboard +cmdline_compl +cmdline_hist +cmdline_info +comments 
+xsmp_interact +xterm_clipboard -xterm_save

I have:

set clipboard=unnamedplus

in my .vimrc and it is set when I do:

set clipboard?

or

:echo has('clipboard')

I am using Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, and vim inside gnome-terminal (but also GVim has the same problem). Any idea?

Thanks

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5
  • stackoverflow.com/questions/11489428/… This may help you out a bit.
    – coteyr
    Sep 19, 2013 at 14:55
  • Did you quit vim between typing "+y on visual selection and trying to paste outside vim ? It won't work if you do
    – Samuel Peter
    Sep 23, 2013 at 2:48
  • @SamuelPeter No, I didn't quit vim
    – gc5
    Sep 23, 2013 at 9:07
  • 1
    I ran into this issue because I was doing set clipboard+=unnamedplus something in the default setting was disabling it. Changing to clipboard=unnamedplus (eg removing other settings) worked for me.
    – JonnyRaa
    Jun 26, 2018 at 9:01
  • As @JonnyLeeds mentioned. The config set clipboard+=unnamed & set clipboard+=unnamedplus doesn't work while using y and p for share the system clipboard. :set clipboard? == clipboard=autoselect,exclude:cons\|linux,unnamed,unnamedplus; After I removed the first +, which is set clipboard=unnamed and set clipboard+=unnamedplus, and it works!! :set clipboard? == clipboard=unnamed,unnamedplus
    – Marslo
    Jun 27, 2018 at 15:17

5 Answers 5

Reset to default
112

This is what works for me (Ubuntu 13.10):

Reinstall vim as vim-gtk:

sudo apt-get install vim-gtk

select what you want using the mouse - then type to copy to clipboard:

"+y

to paste to vim from clipboard type:

"+p

I don't know why but comparing the output of vim --version shows that the usual vim installation is quite restricted compared to vim-gtk. Replacing vim with vim-gtk did not affect any plugings.

Further information:

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8
  • 1
    I cannot express how much you helped me and how much I am happy now :D
    – 7hi4g0
    Mar 23, 2014 at 21:09
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    Interestingly, on 14.04 both regular VIM and VIM-GTK have xterm_clipboard support, but "+p does not work in regular VIM. Rather than clipping to the clipboard, it increases the amont of selected lines.
    – dotancohen
    Dec 1, 2014 at 10:36
  • 1
    Installing vim-gtk ultimately worked for me in 14.04.4, but I experienced things a bit differently than others commenting. Prior to having vim-gtk installed, vim was showing -xterm_clipboard (i.e. not enabled). After installing vim-gtk it shows (+xterm_clipboard). I am checking this with vim --version | grep clip. Anyway, makes sense that you need +xterm_clipboard!
    – overthink
    Jun 12, 2016 at 16:19
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    This is a great solution. Actually, I've made this my first thing to do after installing a new Ubuntu OS.
    – linbianxiaocao
    Aug 5, 2016 at 15:06
  • Installing vim-gtk worked for me. Thanks
    – Miguel Mota
    Aug 11, 2016 at 16:28
7

I am going to leave the original answer below because it may be important for others that search for this question.

In short there doesn't seem to be a one size fits all answer, but with 'set clipboard=unnamedplus' one of either '*p' or '+p' should work from the "system" clipboard.

'*p' is almost certainly the one you want. (from here)

vim is a cli program. When using it inside gnome-terminal (or any terminal emulator) crtl+c (or any key combination) is handled by the terminal emulator first, then the shell, then finally by the program (vim in this case). vim and ctrl+c will almost certainly never work because ctrl+c sends an SIGINT signal to the running task. vim uses SIGINT to stop other things like aborting insert mode, or stopping search functions.

In other words. Ctrl+C is never actually passed to VIM. SIGINT is passed to VIM. SIGINT has other uses in vim so using to copy is likely not going to work (and even if can you force it, not a good idea).

Instead try sticking with Ctrl+Shift+C and Ctrl+Shift+V (there are others but I believe those put text in the system clipboard)

To be fair I don't know much about gvim.

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2
  • Maybe I confused you.. I said using ctrl-c OUTSIDE vim and the pasting with p, but in vim I know I have to use y.. I'll edit my question
    – gc5
    Sep 19, 2013 at 14:49
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    LOL haven't had my caffeine yet, sorry.
    – coteyr
    Sep 19, 2013 at 14:52
5

Use in your vimrc:

set mouse=a

It will allow you to select and copy manually with mouse.

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5

In addition to the accepted answer, if you are working remotely over SSH (e.g. over tmux with multiple panes with different vim processes you want to copy between), you also need to export your X display since vim is using xterm-clipboard to interface between different processes. You can set the X display by running

export DISPLAY=:0.0

This must be run before vim is launched, and under any other shell you have.

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4

I have found on Ubuntu 16.04 I need vim-gui-common installed in order for "+y to work.

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1
  • 1
    Per the VIM docs, :h registers: For Unix systems the clipboard is only available when the +xterm_clipboard feature is present. If you look at the vim --version output before and after installing vim-gui-common, you'll see that the xterm_clipboard feature gets added, which is what's needed. (aside: the vim-gui-common package is basically installing gvim)
    – villapx
    Dec 11, 2019 at 18:57

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