How to change drive in Netrw and how to stay in givm window but quit Netrw?

Question

As a newbie in vim I am full of silly questions. :D

Running gvim on Windows 7 64bit, I am careful to avoid complex plugins but try to start from whatever existing to be familiar with the tool.

So now I cannot find a way to lookup files on D drive, how to switch in Netrw? Do I have to mount it like in Linux?

Also, how to quit Netrw but still stay in gvim?

Last question, is nerdtree really much better than netrw?

Answer 1

A way to lookup files on D drive

The plugin is triggered by :editing a directory, so this is what you'll do:

:edit D:\

You could also :cd D:\ first, and then :edit ., or use the dedicated :Ex, :Sex, etc. command(s) that the plugin provides.

How to quit Netrw but still stay in gvim

In Vim, everything is a buffer displayed in a window. Unlike in IDEs, plugins have to "fake" their user interface as special buffers. So, you leave the netrw buffer like any other: Start :edit file, or :enew for a new one, or :bdelete, or :bnext, or ...

Is nerdtree really much better than netrw

The main differentiator is that NERDTree defaults to a hierarchical file listing in a left-hand sidebar (similar to Windows Explorer). You can have that in netrw, too (let g:netrw_liststyle = 3). There's feature parity in other areas, too (e.g. bookmarks), while some things are unique to NERDTree (fancier tree visualization, customizable action menu). netrw provides transparent access to remote file systems, which NERDTree doesn't. You can even use both in parallel!

I'd recommend to read NERDTree's help, and once you run into something that netrw doesn't do well, remember NERDTree and put it to the test.