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This question might seem a bit odd but I searched for like an hour and didn't find any hit that actually answered my question(s) about the auto-complete features of geany:

  • does it have auto-complete
  • for which languages does it have auto-complete (plugins?)
  • how do i use auto-complete
jww
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Sim
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6 Answers6

23

How about simply put: Ctrl+Space

Peter O.
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HongboZhu
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    To autocomplete project methods, you have to have the file open with declaration of the method. – eddy147 Sep 13 '13 at 09:19
16

I know 4 years passed ... but the correct answer is :

Edit->Preferences->Editor->Completions->[Check the "Autocomplete all words in document"] press (CTRL+SPACE)

Amin Adel
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    Also you want to decrease the number of needed character for autocomplete. At least I prefer 2 instead of 4. – mayid May 27 '19 at 21:29
11

Geany does have autocomplete.

The main way autocomplete is used is by typing a long word, and by narrowing that list of autocomplete possibilities down. Let's say you type gtk_combo_box_. It will have a small list of different commands that match this description. Typing eTAB will narrow the search down to gtk_combo_box_entry_. Typing sENTER will then bring it to the proper to gtk_combo_entry_set_text_column. See the Geany manual.

Noah Singer
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8

Geany uses own internal engine and currently limited to:

  • C
  • Pascal
  • PHP
  • HTML
  • LaTeX
  • Python

It file format uses 3 types of encoding:

  • Tagmanager format
  • Pipe-separated format
  • CTags format

With CTAGS you can use external and powerful ctags utility that support a lot of langs.

Refer to official docs: http://www.geany.org/manual/current/#tags

gavenkoa
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4

Geany surely have autocomplete and can offer a list of possible completions for symbols defined in the tags and for all words in a document.

The autocompletion list for symbols is presented when the first few characters of the symbol are typed or when the Complete word (Ctrl-Space) keybinding is pressed.

When the defined keybinding is typed and the Autocomplete all words in document preference is selected then the autocompletion list will show all matching words previously mentioned in the document, if there are no matching symbols.

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Autocompletion also can be based on specific words like keywords and etc. For this you can check this link

Community
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MIRMIX
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3

As the manual states:

Upon opening, files of supported filetypes are parsed to extract the symbol information (aka "workspace symbols"). You can also have Geany automatically load external files containing the symbol information (aka "global tags files") upon startup, or manually using Tools --> Load Tags File.

Global tags files are used to provide symbols for autocompletion and calltips without having to open the source files containing these symbols. This is intended for library APIs, as the tags file only has to be updated when you upgrade the library.

Some global tags files are distributed with Geany and will be loaded automatically when the corresponding filetype is first used. Currently this includes global tags files for these languages: C, Pascal, PHP, HTML, LaTeX, Python

For other languages, like Java, you have to download a tag file from here (if available), and load it upon startup or manually.

solitone
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  • Thanks for the Java info. Somehow I expected this to be more obvious to newbies. Beneath all this non-out-of-the-box setup there may be a really good tool. – Sridhar Sarnobat Sep 09 '22 at 01:39
  • Thanks, the site you provided is great. To load tags automatically at startup one have to place the tag file in geany directory. In my Ubuntu it is `/home/YOUR_NAME/.config/geany/tags` – boczniak767 May 27 '23 at 19:36