Install Vim in Cygwin

I have installed Cygwin on my Windows machine and I have also selected some additional packages as part of my installation (like GCC etc). Now I want to add Vim also to my existing Cygwin setup. What is the procedure to add Vim to my existing Cygwin setup? Or is there some separate binary for Vim in Cygwin which I can untar and install? What is the best option in my current scenario?


You need to run Cygwin's setup.exe again, and select the packages you want. Vim is not included in the default package.

I've blogged about this, with explicit instructions and a picture: Cygwin setup gotchas | Code and comments

After installing Vim you may find that things just don't seem to be what you are used to. That is because Linux systems usually have a default .vimrc file somewhere. It seems that Cygwin does not. In Vim, run :edit $MYVIMRC to see your .vimrc.

You should get a nice .vimrc from somewhere and place it in your home folder for a better experience. Currently I'm using this one.


Run the Cygwin setup.exe and pick additional packages (search for vim), that executable is used to add packages and update existing ones; you should run it once a month to update to latest packages.