Turn on Ack in MacVIm

Question

I'm new to MacVim and have installed Janus. I can't figure out how to search my project using Ack.vim.

For janus it says "Customizations: Janus rebinds command-shift-f () to bring up :Ack." But when I do command-shift-f I get this message:

The plugin ack is disabled for the following reason: The ack program is not installed

How do I use ack? If I have to install it, how do I do so? (guessing it has something to do with .vimrc or .vimrc.after but am not sure)

Thanks

Jobie

Did you install the ack command? Ack.vim call external command ack. – Palatal

I only installed Janus. Shouldn't Ack be included and turned on by default? Otherwise why list it for Janus? – Jobie

Answer 1

You have to install ack first - it is an external program:

Instructions for Mac OS can be found on the ack-website and require MacPorts or homebrew.

Fluviomarine

I have installed ack using MacPorts, which installs the binary ack-5.12. I have setup an alias ack='ack-5.12' but still MacVim refuses to brink ack up – Oistrakh

I still get the same error on Vim, after followin the steps. I've even set the alias. I can run 'ack' on my shell. – Pentobarbital

You have to watch out where you put the alias definition: if you put in the .bashrc file it will not be available when you do not start MacVim from a command line, because .bashrc is not read at login time. You have to put the alias in the .bash_profile file (or if you use zsh into .zprofile I think). More info can be found at wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix_shell#Configuration_files_for_shells – Fluviomarine

Answer 2

Ack is an external program and Ack.vim is only an interface to Ack. You want that interface to Ack if you already use Ack: if you don't already have it on your machine you probably don't need it.

If you really need/want to use Ack, just install it.

Pathos

Answer 3

Actually getting the same thing here with MacVim combined with Janus.

if you open macvim via command-line 'mvim .' then ack is available. if you open via "open new macvim buffer here" ack is not available.

guessing path problems.

Orms

"mvim ." via command did not give access to Ack. Once I installed Ack I was good to go. – Jobie