included file, not in the file that includes
it.
   The "<sfile>:p:h/" part uses the name of the current file (<sfile>),
expands it to a full path (:p) and then takes the head (:h).  This results in
the directory name of the file.  This causes the pod.vim file in the same
directory to be included.

==============================================================================
*44.10*	Synchronizing

Compilers have it easy.  They start at the beginning of a file and parse it
straight through.  Vim does not have it so easy.  It must start in the middle,
where the editing is being done.  So how does it tell where it is?
   The secret is the ":syntax sync" command.  This tells Vim how to figure out
where it is.  For example, the following command tells Vim to scan backward
for the beginning or end of a C-style comment and begin syntax coloring from
there: >

	:syntax sync ccomment

You can tune this processing with some arguments.  The "minlines" argument
tells Vim the minimum number of lines to look backward, and "maxlines" tells
the editor the maximum number of lines to scan.
   For example, the following command tells Vim to look at least 10 lines
before the top of the screen: >

	:syntax sync ccomment minlines=10 maxlines=500

If it cannot figure out where it is in that space, it starts looking farther
and farther back until it figures out what to do.  But it looks no farther
back than 500 lines.  (A large "maxlines" slows down processing.  A small one
might cause synchronization to fail.)
   To make synchronizing go a bit faster, tell Vim which syntax items can be
skipped.  Every match and region that only needs to be used when actually
displaying text can be given the "display" argument.
   By default, the comment to be found will be colored as part of the Comment
syntax group.  If you want to color things another way, you can specify a
different syntax group: >

	:syntax sync ccomment xAltComment

If your programming language does not have C-style comments in it, you can try
another method of synchronization.  The simplest way is to tell Vim to space
back a number of lines and try to figure out things from there.  The following
command tells Vim to go back 150 lines and start parsing from there: >

	:syntax sync minlines=150

A large "minlines" value can make Vim slower, especially when scrolling
backwards in the file.
   Finally, you can specify a syntax group to look for by using this command:
>
	:syntax sync match {sync-group-name}
		\ grouphere {group-name} {pattern}

This tells Vim that when it sees {pattern} the syntax group named {group-name}
begins just after the pattern given.  The {sync-group-name} is used to give a
name to this synchronization specification.  For example, the sh scripting
language begins an if statement with "if" and ends it with "fi":

	if [ --f file.txt ] ; then ~
		echo "File exists" ~
	fi ~

To define a "grouphere" directive for this syntax, you use the following
command: >

	:syntax sync match shIfSync grouphere shIf "\<if\>"

The "groupthere" argument tells Vim that the pattern ends a group.  For
example, the end of the if/fi group is as follows: >

	:syntax sync match shIfSync groupthere NONE "\<fi\>"

In this example, the NONE tells Vim that you are not in any special syntax
region.  In particular, you are not inside an if block.

You also can define matches and regions that are with no "grouphere" or
"groupthere" arguments.  These groups are for syntax groups skipped during
synchronization.  For example, the following skips over anything inside {},
even if it would normally match another synchronization method: >

	:syntax sync match xSpecial /{.*}/

More about synchronizing in the reference manual: |:syn-sync|.

==============================================================================
*44.11*	Installing a syntax file

When your new syntax file is ready to be used, drop it in a "syntax" directory
in 'runtimepath'.  For Unix that would be "~/.config/nvim/syntax".