I did a little experiment:
$ gvim dum
* At this point, the file 'dum' was opened with my proper default,
*~/.vim/vimrc*
$ MYVIMRC=*~/.vimrc.HOLD* ; export MYVIMRC
$ gvim dum
* There are significant theme differences between the two files,
but those differences were *not reflected* in the displayed theme.
$ MYVIMRC="" ; export MYVIMRC
$ unset MYVIMRC
$ VIMRC=*~/.vimrc.HOLD* ; export VIMRC
$ gvim dum
* Again, those differences were *not reflected* in the displayed theme.
So ... are those two variables actually being used anymore?
On 2026-03-18 19:32, Igbanam Ogbuluijah wrote:
On Wed, Mar 18, 2026 at 03:48:19PM +0000, Ben Knoble wrote:
Le 18 mars 2026 à 14:33, Christopher<[email protected]> a écrit :
On Wednesday, March 18, 2026 at 11:48:15 AM UTC-4 D. Ben Knoble wrote:
On Tuesday, March 17, 2026 at 10:38:51 AM UTC-4 Christopher wrote:
When initializing Vim it searches first for $MYVIMRC, although that
file doesn't exist in my case so it immediately goes to .vimrc. I'm
reading the documentation on how to create this $VIMRC file as so
that it's read first, rather then the .vimrc file ?
I'm afraid your question isn't clear to me, but let's look at `:help
myvimrc`:
c. Five places are searched for initializations. The first that
exists
is used, the others are ignored. The `$MYVIMRC` environment variable
is
set to the file that was first found, unless `$MYVIMRC` was already set
when using VIMINIT. The `$MYVIMDIR` environment variable is
set to the personal 'rtp' directory, however it is not verified
that the directory actually exists.
I The environment variable VIMINIT (see also |compatible-default|)
(*)
The value of $VIMINIT is used as an Ex command line.
II The user vimrc file(s):
"$HOME/.vimrc" (for Unix) (*)
"$HOME/.vim/vimrc" (for Unix) (*)
"$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/vim/vimrc" (for Unix) (*)
"s:.vimrc" (for Amiga) (*)
"home:.vimrc" (for Amiga) (*)
"home:vimfiles:vimrc" (for Amiga) (*)
"$VIM/.vimrc" (for Amiga) (*)
"$HOME/_vimrc" (for Win32) (*)
"$HOME/vimfiles/vimrc" (for Win32) (*)
"$VIM/_vimrc" (for Win32) (*)
"$HOME/config/settings/vim/vimrc" (for Haiku) (*)
Note: For Unix and Amiga, when ".vimrc" does not exist,
"_vimrc" is also tried, in case an MS-DOS compatible file
system is used. For MS-Windows ".vimrc" is checked after
"_vimrc", in case long file names are used.
Note: For Win32, "$HOME" is checked first. If no "_vimrc" or
".vimrc" is found there, "$VIM" is tried. See |$VIM| for when
$VIM is not set.
III The environment variable EXINIT.
The value of $EXINIT is used as an Ex command line.
IV The user exrc file(s). Same as for the user vimrc file, but with
"vimrc" replaced by "exrc". But only one of ".exrc" and "_exrc" is
used, depending on the system. And without the (*)!
V The default vimrc file, $VIMRUNTIME/defaults.vim. This sets up
options values and has "syntax on" and "filetype on" commands,
which is what most new users will want. See |defaults.vim|.
So, unless you use VIMINIT to set MYVIMRC, MYVIMRC is intended to be
set _by Vim_ to the file it finds.
Most folks I know use either ~/.vimrc or ~/.vim/vimrc (with equivalent
~/_vimrc or ~/vimfiles/vimrc on Windows).
I read the documentation, therefore like with many I also use the system
wide .vimrc file when starting vim. I want to know how to set the $MYVIMRC
as the documentation ?
Vim should set it automatically; “:let $MYVIMRC” should show the value, for
example.
I don’t recommend using the system-wide vimrc for anything beyond extremely
niche use cases (maybe special hardware or software settings?). The per-user
vimrc is more predictable to reason about. In a single-user environment this
may matter less, but still.
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Hold on… the OP may have a point here.
The documentation does say something about environment variables; but I
think we are jumping into some user-global VIMRC because, quite frankly,
that's the cultural way of going this. But…!
The documentation does say there's an environment variable `VIMINIT`
which can be set as an Ex command, and this would be the first place Vim
looks to for initialization configuration. Now, the way I got this to
work is
VIMINIT="set number relativenumber" vim
I did this on a blank install of vim. Without the VIMINIT variable set,
there are no numbers.
So if you're looking to set an environment variable Vim respects on
initialization, this is it. That said, the amount of customizations
going into Vim these days is way too much for an environment variable;
plus… if you want to use the environment variable to source some file,
you might as well use a VIMRC, and use the `runtime` command for multipe
files. I think this is the reason the community has culturally favoured
the VIMRC route for customizations.
Just thought to call this out since the OP was specific about an
environment variable.
~ Igbanam
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