Nix Neovim Kitty

A deliberately specific integration for Neovim + Kitty + Dolphin/KDE.

When Dolphin opens a file, nvim-kitty:

1. Finds every managed Neovim instance running inside Kitty.
2. Checks whether one of them already has that file loaded.
3. Selects the existing Neovim window/buffer and its exact Kitty tab.
4. Otherwise opens the file in a new tab of the existing Kitty instance.
5. Starts Kitty normally when no Kitty instance exists.

Terminal launches through vi, vim, or nvim can also be found from Dolphin.

The package also installs its own nvim.desktop. It calls nvim-kitty, uses Terminal=false, and disables startup notification.

Demo.mp4

Requirements

This discovers Kitty's abstract remote-control socket through /proc/net/unix. Kitty must enable remote control and use the matching socket name:

programs.kitty.settings = {
  allow_remote_control = "socket-only";
  listen_on = "unix:@kitty-main";
};

The default kittySocketName is "kitty-main".

On Plasma/Wayland, KWin may turn an external focus request into an orange taskbar attention marker. This Plasma Manager setting permits nvim-kitty to focus Kitty:

programs.plasma.configFile.kwinrc."Windows"."FocusStealingPreventionLevel" = 0;

Use the stock Neovim package

Add the flake input:

inputs.nix-nvim-kitty = {
  url = "github:JakeHPark/nix-nvim-kitty";
  inputs.nixpkgs.follows = "nixpkgs";
};

Then use the overlay and install the package:

nixpkgs.overlays = [ inputs.nix-nvim-kitty.overlays.default ];

environment.systemPackages = [ pkgs.nvim-kitty ];

Wrap an already configured Neovim package

nixpkgs.overlays = [
  (final: prev: {
    nvim-kitty-custom = final.makeNvimKittyPackage {
      neovim = prev.wrapNeovimUnstable prev.neovim-unwrapped {
        viAlias = true;
        vimAlias = true;
        luaRcContent = builtins.readFile ./modules/neovim/init.lua;
        # Your existing wrapperArgs/plugins/etc.
      };
    };
  })
];

Note that you shouldn't call the new package nvim-kitty, because this flake could end up overriding it.

Custom socket name

A non-default Kitty socket name must be changed in both places:

final.makeNvimKittyPackage {
  kittySocketName = "my-kitty-socket";
}

programs.kitty.settings.listen_on = "unix:@my-kitty-socket";

Binaries

• nvim-kitty: Dolphin/desktop launcher.
• nvim-kitty-child: starts and registers a Neovim RPC server inside a Kitty window.
• nvim, vim, vi: symlinks to nvim-kitty-child.