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preservim
nerdtree
Vim Script2010–2025
preservim / nerdtree

nerdtree

A tree explorer plugin for vim.

Developer Tools
Explore on GitHubRead Hacker News discussions
14Distinct people
14Mentions
0Explicit recommenders
20.1KGitHub stars
REPOSITORY AT A GLANCE

What to know before exploring

What it is

A tree explorer plugin for vim.

GitHub

Where it is used

No documented product use was verified in the last source check.

What people are saying

No recommendation phrase was found in the indexed comments.

No classified warning is attached to this page. Read the discussions before treating silence as approval.

Also in these discussions

Mentioned in the same Hacker News threads. That is not proof they are substitutes.

This week on Hacker News

Nov 7–Nov 14 UTC · Direct repository links and separately labeled related project stories. Indexed through 11/14/2026, 1:49:46 PM UTC.

No direct repository links were found in the indexed HN discussions over the past seven days. Older discussions are available below.

Mentions over time

HN mentions by year14 dated mentions

Observed mentions: 2010-08-10 15:21:29 UTC to 2025-07-27 20:56:17 UTC.

01232010-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2011-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments20102011-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2012-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2012-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2013-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2013-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 3 mentions; 0 submissions, 3 comments2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 0 submissions, 2 comments2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments20172018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 0 submissions, 2 comments2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2025

Counts come from the repository’s dated source evidence. Index cutoff: 2026-11-02 08:16:59 UTC.

View mention counts and date ranges
UTC ranges include their start and exclude their end. Select a period to filter the source evidence.
PeriodStart (UTC)End (exclusive, UTC)MentionsSubmissionsComments
20102010-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2011-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20112011-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2012-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20122012-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2013-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20132013-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20142014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC303
20152015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20162016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC202
20172017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20182018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20192019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20202020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20212021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20222022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC202
20232023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20242024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20252025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101

What Hacker News says

14 sources
godelski·Jul 27, 2025
> debuggers Parent mentioned >> DAP Here's the docs[0] > popup context windows for docs These are called "balloon"s[1]. Plenty of people have setups for things like docs (press "K") or other things (By default "K" assumes a man page) > contextual buttons on a line of code I don't know what this means, can you explain? > minimap Do you mean something like this?[2] Personally, I use tagbar[3] as I like using ctags and being able to jump around in the project. The "minimap" is the only one here that isn't native. You can also have the file tree on the left if you want. Most people tend to use NerdTree[4], but like with a lot of plugins, there's builtins that are just as good. Here's the help page for netrw[5], vim's native File Explorer Btw, this all works in vim. No need for neovim for any of this stuff. Except for the debugger
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, this stuff has been here for quite some time. The debugger has been around as a plugin for awhile too. All this stuff has been here since I started using vim, which was over a decade ago (maybe balloons didn't have as good of an interface? Idk, it's been awhile) [0] https://vimdoc.sourceforge.net/htmldoc/debugger.html [1] https://vimdoc.sourceforge.net/htmldoc/options.html#'balloon... [2] https://github.com/wfxr/minimap.vim [3] https://github.com/preservim/tagbar [4] https://github.com/preservim/nerdtree [5] https://vimhelp.org/pi_netrw.txt.html#netrw
In Performance and telemetry analysis of Trae IDE, ByteDance's VSCode fork
lizardking·Oct 15, 2022
I use a lot of them, many specific to my work, but here are some of the ones that I think will most improve the quality of life for most developers. - For a plug-in manager I user packer - For file/text search I recommend telescope (https://github.com/nvim-telescope/telescope.nvim) - Copilot (https://github.com/github/copilot.vim) - Nerd tree for file browsing (https://github.com/preservim/nerdtree) - commentary for commenting (https://github.com/tpope/vim-commentary) - ALE for linting (https://github.com/dense-analysis/ale) - Mason for installing LSP servers (https://github.com/williamboman/mason.nvim) Once you have the proper tooling in place you can do pretty much everything in vim that you are doing in vs code or intelliJ. I've just started using it for most of my dev work recently and I have found ThePrimeagen's youtube videos on vim
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to be a great resource. Series on using vim as you editor (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLm323Lc7iSW_wuxqmKx_x...) Introduction to setting up your vim configuration (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2QJYq4IX6M&t=512s) I recommend giving it a try. The process of learning it all was fun, and as you may have heard you can eventually get pretty quick using Vim.
In Ask HN: Is it still possible to live in a terminal?
Cyph0n·Dec 4, 2018
I'm relatively new to Vim (~4 months). I used the "learning by doing" approach by forcing myself to use Vim to write C and Python at work. I had two main reasons for learning Vim: (1) Vim is everywhere, so it must be worth it to learn the basics at least; and (2) modal editing felt easier on my wrists than the standard mouse + shortcuts approach I ended up using in other IDEs. Here is my advice: 1. Start with only a theme in your .vimrc, so no plugins or non-standard key bindings. 2. Use Vimtutor (or any other tutorial) to learn the basics: normal vs. insert mode, movement, manipulation, yank/paste (+ clipboard), splits, buffers, and searching. 3. As you write code, you will find yourself wanting to know how to do X. This is where Google and a simple "cheatsheet" file come in. Once you find out how to do X via Google, add an entry to your
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cheatsheet file (example in HTML form: [1]). 4. In many cases, you will find that a plugin will solve one of your issues. Install that plugin and add it to your .vimrc. I recommend vim-plug[2] for managing and installing plugins. 5. There are many useful plugins out there. Two I would strongly recommend: CtrlP[3] and NERDTree[4]. Once you have a good grasp of Vim, I would recommend exploring Emacs + Evil-mode if you want a more complete IDE experience. [1]: https://assil.me/2018/11/12/vim-cheatsheet.html [2]: https://github.com/junegunn/vim-plug [3]: https://github.com/kien/ctrlp.vim [4]: https://github.com/scrooloose/nerdtree
In Absolute Beginner's Guide to Emacs (2012)
yefim·Nov 15, 2016
Different strokes for different folks but I really love vim split views. I have Ctrl-h, Ctrl-j, Ctrl-k, and Ctrl-l mapped to navigate between my splits with ease as well as using the vim plugin Golden Ratio[1] to make the current focused split larger than the rest. If you really need the tree view, I've heard great things about NERD Tree[2]. Feel free to check out my .vimrc[3] for other neat tricks and plugins :) [1] https://github.com/roman/golden-ratio [2] https://github.com/scrooloose/nerdtree [3] https://github.com/yefim/dotfiles/blob/master/.vimrc
In Ask HN: How to improve vim productivity and workflow?
inDigiNeous·Apr 13, 2016
The fact that I can customize VIM to suit my needs with modern methods and plugins that bring same kind of functionality found in more modern editors/development envs to the powerhouse that is VIM. For example, these are some of my favorites: https://valloric.github.io/YouCompleteMe/ - Code completion for C/C++ and other languages https://github.com/ctrlpvim/ctrlp.vim - TextMate style ctrl+p fuzzy file finder https://github.com/scrooloose/nerdtree - Tree explorer plugin for browsing files https://github.com/vim-airline/vim-airline - Customizable status line for showing all kinds of useful info about currently edited file https://github.com/tpope/vim-fugitive - Git wrapper that works together with airline https://github.com/mhinz/vim-startify - Shows your most recently edited files and favorite files on the start screen https://github.com/
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tpope/vim-abolish - Smart text replacement, easily replace eg. getColor, GetColor -> getTransparency, GetColor and so on And this combined with the fact that I can do all of this from the tip of my fingers, without having to touch the mouse, with high customizable commands that go into my muscle memory, there is no substitute for VIM for me. I've worked with Eclipse, Xcode, Visual Studio. They have some pretty nice features, like interactive debugging that are hard to replicate with Vim, but I'm more of a "print debug message" kind of guy anyway, so that doesn't bother me. The biggest hinderance with Visual UIs is that I have to use the mouse, and that sucks. So much faster to do text selection, copying, replacement, renaming and so on straight from the keyboard, once you get used to it. I'm still discovering active new ways to customize VIM after over 15 years of using it.
In Vim 8.0 is coming
nerdfiles·Jun 17, 2012
I prefer Alfred (http://www.alfredapp.com/) over Quicksilver. Recommending: 1. https://github.com/Lokaltog/vim-powerline 2. https://github.com/revans/bash-it 3. https://github.com/tpope/vim-fugitive, https://github.com/tpope/surround 4. The https://github.com/scrooloose/nerdtree 5. http://bywordapp.com/ 6. http://bbt2.drikin.com/ 7. http://willmore.eu/software/isolator/ 8. https://gist.github.com/2260182 (OS X for Hackers) 9. Cathode (http://www.secretgeometry.com/apps/cathode/, for shits and giggles) 10. DiffMerge (http://www.sourcegear.com/diffmerge/) 11. Electric Sheep (http://www.electricsheep.org/) 12. Gridwars (http://gridwars.marune.de/) 13. Integrity (http://peacockmedia.co.uk/integrity/) 14. httrack (http://www.httrack.com/) 15. iSoul (http://code.google.com/p/isoul/) 16. LittleIpsum (http://littleipsum.com/) 17. KeyCastr (https:
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//github.com/sdeken/keycastr, more shits) 18. LiveReload (http://livereload.com/) 19. Mactracker (http://mactracker.ca/) 20. Onyx and/or Maintenance (http://www.titanium.free.fr/) 21. MAMP (http://www.mamp.info/) 22. MacVim (http://code.google.com/p/macvim/) 23. Patterns (http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/patterns-the-regex-app/id4294...) 24. Mou (http://mouapp.com/) 25. mutt (http://www.mutt.org/) 26. Pixelmator (http://www.pixelmator.com/) 27. ProCSSor (http://procssor.com/) 28. Reeder (http://reederapp.com/) 29. Skim (http://skim-app.sourceforge.net/) 30. Slammer (http://ringce.com/slammer) 31. Q (http://www.kju-app.org/) 32. svnX (http://www.lachoseinteractive.net/en/community/subversion/sv...) 33. SSHTunnel (https://github.com/primalmotion/sshtunnel) 34. localtunnel (http://progrium.com/localtunnel/) 35. The Unarchiver (http://wakaba.c3.cx/s/apps/unarchiver.html) 36. Homebrew (http://mxcl.github.com/homebrew/) 37. VLC Player (http://www.videolan.org) 38. Compass/SASS/LESS (http://compass-style.org/install/, http://sass-lang.com/, http://lesscss.org/) 39. Pandoc (http://johnmacfarlane.net/pandoc/) 40. http://code.google.com/p/zen-coding/
In Ask HN: Just ordered my first Mac- what apps should I know about?
elasticdog·Aug 10, 2010
I'd advise putting your vim directory (or ALL of your dotfiles) under version control. To keep things clean, the first thing you should do is install Tim Pope's pathogen plugin which allows you to install each plugin in its own self-contained directory under ~/.vim/bundle/plugin-name/, and it will autoload everything for you. $ cd ~/.vim/ $ git init $ mkdir {autoload,bundle} $ wget -O autoload/pathogen.vim http://www.vim.org/scripts/download_script.php?src_id=12116 $ git add autoload/pathogen.vim $ git commit -m 'add pathogen.vim plugin' Then, you can just extract each plugin under that bundle directory, or if they're managed by the same version control software you're using, you can use something like git submodules to track the plugins automatically. Add this to the top of your ~/.vimrc file: filetype off call pathoge
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n#runtime_append_all_bundles() filetype plugin indent on ...and you're off to the races. Let's say you want to add NERD_tree: $ git submodule add http://github.com/scrooloose/nerdtree.git bundle/nerdtree $ git submodule init $ git commit -m 'add nerd tree plugin as submodule' From then on, you'll be able to track upstream changes to the plugin, and everything is self-contained so you don't have to worry about copying all the files into /doc, /ftplugin, /syntax, etc. The one thing you'll want to do is generate all of the help docs after you have your plugins installed by loading up vim and running: :call pathogen#helptags() The list of what I use goes a little something like this: @ pathogen - to cleanly organize all of your plugins @ bufexplorer - to explore your open buffers @ command-t - a better fuzzy finder for opening files @ endwise - add proper end statements for ruby code @ fugitive - fantastic git wrapper @ matchit - jump to matching brackets or logical statements @ nerdtree - navigate and manipulate files @ pastie - post code to pastie.org @ repeat - adds the ability to repeat functions with . @ speeddating - Ctrl-A/Ctrl-X manipulate dates properly @ surround - alter stuff that surrounds text like quotes and html tags @ taglist - helpful source code browser Beyond that, I have a bunch of syntax files for various languages and file formats. Realistically though, if you're just starting out. Learn how to use the editor first, then if you notice certain use cases that you don't have with built-in features (and there are a TON), then start looking for plugins to make your life easier. There's a lot you can do with custom settings and functions in your ~/.vimrc file too, so it will take time (years) to build up what works best for you. Be patient, it's worth it! If you're curious, you can always find gems by looking through other people's configs: http://github.com/elasticdog/dotfiles
In Ask HN: What Vim Plugins do you use?

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