Solarized theme on Vim + Terminator + Ubuntu 11.10

Question

I am trying to setup solarized theme for vim on Terminator but it is not working. :-( I was successfully able to setup solarized for terminator but it just doesn't seem to work for vim. Here is what my .vimrc looks like

call pathogen#infect()
filetype plugin indent on
syntax enable
set background=dark
"set t_Co=16
"let g:solarized_termcolors=16
let g:solarized_visibility = "high"
let g:solarized_contrast = "high"
colorscheme solarized

$TERM is set to xterm

I have also tried it with the two lines above uncommented but still not working.

Could someone please tell me what I am doing wrong?

Thanks!

Edit:

Answer 1

As Ethan Schoonover pointed out in his vim colorscheme readme, to make the colorscheme work first you have to configure your terminal colour palette.

In terminator there is a github repo that holds the colour configuration for the dark and light scheme.

The problem is that that palette isn't right either :P, the correct one is the one a guy posted in an issue on that same repo.

The correct configuration is the following (at least for the dark scheme):

[[solarized-dark]]
  palette = "#073642:#dc322f:#859900:#b58900:#268bd2:#d33682:#2aa198:#eee8d5:#002b36:#cb4b16:#586e75:#657b83:#839496:#6c71c4:#93a1a1:#fdf6e3"
  cursor_color = "#eee8d5"
  foreground_color = "#eee8d5"
  background_color = "#002b36"

After that, you have to configure the solarized colorscheme:

syntax on
set t_Co=16
set background=dark
colorscheme solarized

A couple of things to have in mind:

1. Normally, the set t_Co=16 line is not necessary because most terminal emulators only support 16 colours (terminator for example). But I rather be explicit than implicit (specially if you are going to sync your files between multiple computers).

2. The line set g:solarized_termcolors=16 is the default, so you can put it or not: it won't make any difference.

3. In my experience the 256 colour version is better (I like more grey background over a blue one; but that's personal taste :P). Contrary to what everyone could think, the 256 colour scheme is actually the 'fallback' being the 16 one the default. Yeah, weird, most people would think that 256 > 16. Anyway, to use the 'fallback' you have to change the lines to the following:

   set t_Co=256
   set g:solarized_termcolors=256
   

4. There are actually some issues with colour output in other CLI applications, I suggest you to go and read Seebi article about dircolors and an ongoing(?) discussion on the solarized github issue tracker.