To use it, add the following to your vimrc, or create file ~/.vim/plugin/filechanged.vim (Unix) or $HOME/vimfiles/plugin/filechanged.vim (Windows) containing the script below, then restart Vim. au FileChangedShell * call FCSHandler(expand(":p")) function FCSHandler(name) endfunction You can easily customize this code to take whatever action you desire for the various values of v:fcs_reason, by setting v:fcs_choice (for example, you could reload the buffer if the mode has changed). Based on discussion on the vim_use mailing list.