Highlight python docstrings as comments (vim syntax highlighting)

Question

Is it possible to modify python.vim (and the corresponding colorscheme file) such that triple-quoted strings right under class and def statements (a.k.a. docstrings) will be

Answer 1

The following worked for me:

syn region pythonDocstring  start=+^\s*[uU]\?[rR]\?"""+ end=+"""+ keepend excludenl contains=pythonEscape,@Spell,pythonDoctest,pythonDocTest2,pythonSpaceError
syn region pythonDocstring  start=+^\s*[uU]\?[rR]\?'''+ end=+'''+ keepend excludenl contains=pythonEscape,@Spell,pythonDoctest,pythonDocTest2,pythonSpaceError

Taken from a modified python.vim from here.

Answer 2

PEP 257 prescribes to use """triple double quotes""" for docstrings. It's not obligatory to include '''triple single quotes''' or "single double quotes" into docstrings. There is one difficulty that we have class docstrings, function docstrings, module docstrings, attribute docstrings and additional docstrings. That's why I decided that it's easier to consider docstring as following:

syn region pythonDocString start=+^\s*"""+ end=+"""+ keepend contains=...

And then:

HiLink pythonDocString        Comment

You may see examples in this script (search pythonDocString): https://github.com/andbar-ru/python-syntax/blob/master/syntax/python.vim

Answer 3

you can add the following line:

syn region Comment start=/"""/ end=/"""/

to your ~/.vim/after/syntax/python.vim. You can create this file if it doesn't exists.