Question

I currently have to edit some very large XML files, which slows down syntax highlighting to a point where it’s absolutely unusable – it takes multiple seconds to update the screen after a search operation, for example.

When disabling syntax highlighting (:syn off), the same operations happen instantaneously. Unfortunately, disabling syntax highlighting appears to happen globally, so all other files now have it disabled as well.

So: Is there a way to only disable syntax highlighting for a given buffer?

Answer 1

You can set :syntax manual and then enable it with set syntax=ON in the buffers you like. Also see :help :syn-manual.