Turning vim into an IDE: Part 1

Probably like many other users of vim (or gvim), I have never taken the time to set it up so that it works like a modern IDE with auto-completion, syntax checking, and whatever else. I've decided to start sorting this out.

My starting point is the following _gvimrc (in C:\Users\noel) which sets the behaviour of the tab key and indentation for several different file formats. I also highlight whitespace at the end of lines so that I don't add it by accident.

autocmd FileType python set expandtab
autocmd FileType python set sw=4
autocmd FileType python set ts=4
autocmd FileType python set autoindent

autocmd FileType cmake set expandtab
autocmd FileType cmake set sw=2
autocmd FileType cmake set ts=2
autocmd FileType cmake set autoindent

autocmd FileType html set expandtab
autocmd FileType html set sw=2
autocmd FileType html set ts=2
autocmd FileType html set autoindent

autocmd FileType javascript set expandtab
autocmd FileType javascript set sw=2
autocmd FileType javascript set ts=2
autocmd FileType javascript set autoindent

autocmd FileType css set expandtab
autocmd FileType css set sw=2
autocmd FileType css set ts=2
autocmd FileType css set autoindent

" Highlight whitespace at end of line
highlight ExtraWhitespace ctermbg=red guibg=red
autocmd Syntax * syn match ExtraWhitespace /\s\+$\| \+\ze\t/

" Don't create those annoying backup files ending with ~
set nobackup