Ubuntu, vim, and the solarized color palette

Question

I'd really like to get in on all the colorful goodness of the solarized colorscheme, but I can't seem to get it configured just right.
I have the main solarized file in my .vim/colors folder, I've set my terminal profile colors to what is listed on the site, and I've added the lines

 set background=dark
 let g:solarized_termcolors=16
 colorscheme solarized

to my .vimrc, but vim looks grey-ed out and is using a bright green color as the default. Any ideas?

Answer 1

Here's my recommendation for things to try:

1. ensure syntax on is in your .vimrc
2. Check what t_Co vim has picked up from your term emulator (a quick :echo &t_Co). If it's 8 you'll want to se t_Co=16. You might also try se t_Co=256 though without let g:solarized_termcolors=16 this will use the 256 fallback mode, which isn't quite the correct color scheme.

I'd comment on the question above for the following, but karma of 50 is required. Please do email me via the project site to troubleshoot this further as I am in the process of establishing a good walkthrough for common color issues.