How to get group name of highlighting under cursor in vim?

Question

I usually customize existing colorscheme to meet my needs.

If I could get the syntax group name under cursor, it would help me a lot, just like Firebu

Answer 1

The following function will output both the name of the syntax group, and the translated syntax group of the character the cursor is on:

function! SynGroup()                                                            
    let l:s = synID(line('.'), col('.'), 1)                                       
    echo synIDattr(l:s, 'name') . ' -> ' . synIDattr(synIDtrans(l:s), 'name')
endfun

To make this more convenient it can be wrapped in a custom command or key binding.

How this works:

• line('.') and col('.') return the current position
• synID(...) returns a numeric syntax ID
• synIDtrans(l:s) translates the numeric syntax id l:s by following highlight links
• synIDattr(l:s, 'name') returns the name corresponding to the numeric syntax ID

This will echo something like:

vimMapModKey -> Special