MLWF - My Lovely Word Finder

A fast, live text search plugin for Neovim with smart filtering and beautiful highlighting. Search for words, environment variables, function names, or any text across your entire project.

Features

• Live search - Results update as you type
• Fast search powered by ripgrep
• Smart filtering: Excludes node_modules, build directories, minified files
• Beautiful UI: Clean bottom-split interface that matches your theme
• Match highlighting: Matched text highlighted with bright colors
• Jump to location: Press Enter to jump to exact file and line
• Syntax highlighting: File paths, line numbers, and content all colored

Use Cases

• Find where environment variables are used: NEXT_PUBLIC_API_URL
• Search for function calls: calculateTotal
• Find TODO comments: TODO:
• Locate configuration values: API_KEY
• Track down variable usage across files

Dependencies

Required:

• ripgrep (rg) - Ultra-fast text search tool

Installing ripgrep

# Ubuntu/Debian
sudo apt install ripgrep

# Arch Linux
sudo pacman -S ripgrep

# macOS
brew install ripgrep

Installation

Using lazy.nvim

{
  'enheit/mlwf',
  config = function()
    require('mlwf').setup({
      -- Optional: customize configuration
      exclude_patterns = {
        'node_modules',
        '.git',
        'dist',
        'build',
      },
      window_height = 15,
    })

    -- Set keybinding
    vim.keymap.set('n', '<leader>fw', ':MLWFFind<CR>', { desc = 'Find Word' })
  end,
}

Using packer.nvim

use {
  'enheit/mlwf',
  config = function()
    require('mlwf').setup()
  end,
}

Using vim-plug

Plug 'enheit/mlwf'

" In your init.vim or after plug#end()
lua require('mlwf').setup()

Usage

Default keybinding

Press <leader>fw (usually space + f + w) to open the word finder.

Commands

:MLWFFind    " Open word finder

In the search window

• Type to search for text across all files
• Enter - Jump to selected match (opens file at exact line)
• Ctrl-n / Down - Next result
• Ctrl-p / Up - Previous result
• Esc - Close without selecting
• j/k (normal mode) - Navigate results

Configuration

Default configuration

require('mlwf').setup({
  -- Directories/patterns to exclude from search
  exclude_patterns = {
    'node_modules',
    '.git',
    'dist',
    'build',
    'target',
    '.next',
    'coverage',
    '*.min.js',
    '*.min.css',
  },

  -- Height of the finder window (in lines)
  window_height = 15,
})

-- Set keybinding
vim.keymap.set('n', '<leader>fw', ':MLWFFind<CR>', { desc = 'Find Word' })

Custom keybinding example

require('mlwf').setup({
  -- your config here
})

-- Use any keybinding you prefer
vim.keymap.set('n', '<C-f>', ':MLWFFind<CR>', { desc = 'Find word' })

Exclude additional patterns

require('mlwf').setup({
  exclude_patterns = {
    'node_modules',
    '.git',
    'vendor',        -- Add vendor directory
    '*.pyc',         -- Add Python bytecode
    '__pycache__',   -- Add Python cache
    '*.lock',        -- Add lock files
  },
})

How it works

1. Text search: Uses ripgrep to search file contents
2. Smart filtering: Automatically excludes common build/dependency directories
3. Live updates: Results update with ~200ms debounce as you type
4. Display format: path/to/file.ts:42 - const API = NEXT_PUBLIC_MY_ENV
5. Match highlighting: Your search term is highlighted in bright colors
6. Jump to match: Opens file and positions cursor at the exact line and column

Example searches

NEXT_PUBLIC        → Find all environment variables
TODO:              → Find all TODO comments
calculateTotal     → Find function usage
API_KEY            → Find configuration values
import React       → Find React imports

Integration with other plugins

MLWF is designed to work alongside:

• MLFS - My Lovely File Selector (find files by name)
• MLTS - My Lovely Theme Selector
• MLTB - My Lovely Theme Builder

All plugins follow the same naming convention, code style, and theme integration.

Highlight Groups

You can customize colors by setting these highlight groups:

vim.api.nvim_set_hl(0, 'MLWFSelection', { link = 'CursorLine' })  -- Selected line
vim.api.nvim_set_hl(0, 'MLWFMatch', { link = 'IncSearch' })       -- Matched text
vim.api.nvim_set_hl(0, 'MLWFPath', { link = 'Directory' })        -- File path
vim.api.nvim_set_hl(0, 'MLWFLineNr', { link = 'LineNr' })         -- Line number

Performance

• Ripgrep is extremely fast - can search millions of lines in seconds
• Debounced search - Waits 200ms after you stop typing before searching
• Limited results - Shows max 100 results for UI performance
• Smart exclude - Skips node_modules and build directories automatically

License

MIT

Credits

• Built with ripgrep for blazing fast search
• Inspired by Telescope, fzf.vim, and grep.vim
• Part of the "My Lovely" plugin family