Modifying starting position of cursor in snacks.input?

[poperigby]

I'd like to be able to start the vim.ui.input implementation in command mode, with my cursor at the start. I most often see this dialog for vim.lsp.buf.rename, and I very seldom want to append text to the current name of the symbol. Is there any way to do this without some hacky solution of wrapping it and moving the cursor with vim.api.nvim_win_set_cursor? I didn't find anything in the documentation.

[drowning-cat]

See https://github.com/neovim/neovim/blob/0c9012f295eedd7283bbf7f9a0fbef3781ba50f4/runtime/lua/vim/lsp/buf.lua#L862-L872

vim.keymap.set("n", "<Leader>cn", function()
  vim.ui.input({ prompt = "New Name: ", scope = "cursor" }, function(input)
    if input and #input ~= 0 then
      vim.lsp.buf.rename(input)
    end
  end)
end)

[kaminagakur4]

I asked Claude to lay out my solution in a straightforward, step-by-step manner, so this should be pretty easy to follow. Let me know if you need any extra help.
It isn't documented because there's no option — the behaviour is hard-coded — but you can get it from config alone, without wrapping vim.ui.input.

1. Why the cursor is at the end. lua/snacks/input.lua finishes with

vim.api.nvim_win_call(win.win, function()
  vim.cmd("startinsert!")
end)

The ! is the A form — insert at end of line. Nothing there reads a config key, which is why you found nothing in the docs.

2. on_win alone is too early. snacks.win invokes opts.on_win from inside M:show(), and show() runs during Snacks.win(opts.win) — several lines before that startinsert!. So the callback has to defer.

3. Config-only fix. Put it on the input style, so it also applies to vim.lsp.buf.rename(), which calls vim.ui.input itself and gives you nowhere to pass options:

{
  "folke/snacks.nvim",
  opts = {
    styles = {
      input = {
        on_win = function(self)
          vim.schedule(function()
            if not self:valid() then
              return
            end
            vim.cmd("stopinsert")
            vim.api.nvim_win_set_cursor(self.win, { 1, 0 })
          end)
        end,
      },
    },
  },
}

This works because Snacks.config.style() merges the built-in style under yours (vim.tbl_deep_extend("force", defaults, config.styles[name] or {})), and win.lua folds the named style into the window config.

4. Want insert mode but at column 0 instead? Swap the last two lines for a cursor set followed by vim.cmd("startinsert") — no bang.

5. One wrinkle once you land in normal mode: the input style maps q to cancel and <esc> to cancel, so q closes the prompt rather than being typed. If that bites, override those two in the same styles.input table.

On the snippet above — worth being precise about what it changes, because it isn't the cursor. Those linked lines are vim.lsp.buf.rename(), and core already passes scope, together with the default:

local prompt_opts = {
  prompt = 'New Name: ',
  default = cword,
  scope = 'cursor',
}
vim.ui.input(prompt_opts, function(input) ... end)

So re-passing scope adds nothing — and snacks never reads it anyway; scope appears nowhere in snacks/input.lua or snacks/win.lua. What the snippet actually changes is that it drops default = cword. With no text in the prompt, "cursor at the start" and "cursor at the end" are the same position, so it looks solved — at the cost of the pre-filled symbol name, which is usually the thing you want to edit rather than retype. The style hook above keeps the default and still puts you in front of it.

[poperigby]

Thanks, that works!

[drowning-cat]

Ah, so you simply want to enter Normal mode. Yep, I'd go with the same solution:

Code

return {
  "folke/snacks.nvim",
  ---@type snacks.Config
  opts = {
    styles = {
      input = {},
    },
    input = {
      win = {
        on_win = function(win)
          vim.schedule(function()
            if win:valid() then
              vim.cmd("stopinsert | normal! 0")
            end
          end)
        end,
      },
    },
  },
}

[kaminagakur4]

Thanks, that works!

no worries