diff --git a/pkgs/applications/editors/vim/configurable.nix b/pkgs/applications/editors/vim/configurable.nix
index 9d07121f4cb4..c10db35a51b9 100644
--- a/pkgs/applications/editors/vim/configurable.nix
+++ b/pkgs/applications/editors/vim/configurable.nix
@@ -1,14 +1,38 @@
 # TODO tidy up eg The patchelf code is patching gvim even if you don't build it..
 # but I have gvim with python support now :) - Marc
-args: with args;
+args@{source ? "latest", ...}: with args;
+
+
 let inherit (args.composableDerivation) composableDerivation edf; in
-composableDerivation {} {
+composableDerivation {} (fix: {
 
     name = "vim_configurable-7.3";
 
-    src = args.fetchurl {
-      url = ftp://ftp.vim.org/pub/vim/unix/vim-7.3.tar.bz2;
-      sha256 = "079201qk8g9yisrrb0dn52ch96z3lzw6z473dydw9fzi0xp5spaw";
+    enableParallelBuilding = true; # test this
+
+    src = 
+      builtins.getAttr source {
+      "default" =
+        # latest release
+        args.fetchurl {
+            url = ftp://ftp.vim.org/pub/vim/unix/vim-7.3.tar.bz2;
+            sha256 = "079201qk8g9yisrrb0dn52ch96z3lzw6z473dydw9fzi0xp5spaw";
+          };
+      "vim-nox" =
+          {
+            # vim nox branch: client-server without X by uing sockets
+            # REGION AUTO UPDATE: { name="vim-nox"; type="hg"; url="https://code.google.com/r/yukihironakadaira-vim-cmdsrv-nox/"; branch="cmdsrv-nox"; }
+            src = (fetchurl { url = "http://mawercer.de/~nix/repos/vim-nox-hg-2082fc3.tar.bz2"; sha256 = "293164ca1df752b7f975fd3b44766f5a1db752de6c7385753f083499651bd13a"; });
+            name = "vim-nox-hg-2082fc3";
+            # END
+          }.src;
+      "latest" = {
+        # vim latest usually is vim + bug fixes. So it should be very stable
+         # REGION AUTO UPDATE: { name="vim"; type="hg"; url="https://vim.googlecode.com/hg"; }
+         src = (fetchurl { url = "http://mawercer.de/~nix/repos/vim-hg-7f98896.tar.bz2"; sha256 = "efcb8cc5924b530631a8e5fc2a0622045c2892210d32d300add24aded51866f1"; });
+         name = "vim-hg-7f98896";
+         # END
+      }.src;
     };
 
     configureFlags = ["--enable-gui=auto" "--with-features=${args.features}"];
@@ -54,6 +78,7 @@ composableDerivation {} {
     cscopeSupport    = config.vim.cscope or false;
     # add .nix filetype detection and minimal syntax highlighting support
     ftNixSupport     = config.vim.ftNix or true;
+    netbeansSupport = config.netbeans or true; # eg envim is using it
   };
 
   #--enable-gui=OPTS     X11 GUI default=auto OPTS=auto/no/gtk/gtk2/gnome/gnome2/motif/athena/neXtaw/photon/carbon
@@ -85,4 +110,5 @@ composableDerivation {} {
     homepage = "www.vim.org";
   };
 
-}
+})
+
diff --git a/pkgs/misc/vim-plugins/default.nix b/pkgs/misc/vim-plugins/default.nix
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..b0c70d958217
--- /dev/null
+++ b/pkgs/misc/vim-plugins/default.nix
@@ -0,0 +1,129 @@
+{fetchurl, stdenv, python, cmake, vim}:
+
+/*
+About Vim and plugins
+=====================
+Let me tell you how Vim plugins work, so that you can decide on how to orginize
+your setup.
+
+typical plugin files:
+
+  plugin/P1.vim
+  autoload/P1.vim
+  ftplugin/xyz.vim
+  doc/plugin-documentation.txt
+  README(.md) (nowadays thanks to github)
+
+Traditionally plugins were installed into ~/.vim/* so it was your task to keep track
+of which files belong to what plugin. Now this problem is "fixed" by nix which
+assembles your profile for you.
+
+
+Vim offers the :h rtp setting which works for most plugins. Thus adding adding
+this to your .vimrc should make most plugins work:
+
+  set rtp+=~/.nix-profile/vim-plugins/YouCompleteMe
+  " or for p in ["YouCompleteMe"] | exec 'set rtp+=~/.nix-profile/vim-plugins/'.p | endfor
+
+Its what
+pathogen, vundle, vim-addon-manager (VAM) use.
+
+VAM's benefits:
+- works around after/* directories if they are used in non ~/.vim locations
+- allows activating plugins at runtime, eg when you need them. (works around
+  some au command hooks, eg required for TheNerdTree plugin)
+- VAM checkous out all sources (vim.sf.net, git, mercurial, ...)
+- runs :helptags on update/installation only. Obviously it cannot do that on
+  store paths.
+
+VAM is made up of
+- the code loading plugins
+- an optional pool (github.com/MarcWeber/vim-addon-manager-known-repositories)
+
+That pool probably is the best source to automatically derive plugin
+information from or to lookup about how to get data from www.vim.org.
+
+I'm not sure we should package them all. Most of them are not used much.
+You need your .vimrc anyway, and then VAM gets the job done ?
+
+How to install VAM? eg provide such a bash function:
+
+    vim-install-vam () {
+    mkdir -p ~/.vim/vim-addons && git clone --depth=1 git://github.com/MarcWeber/vim-addon-manager.git ~/.vim/vim-addons/vim-addon-manager && cat >> ~/.vimrc <<EOF
+    set nocompatible
+    set hidden
+    filetype indent plugin on | syn on
+    fun ActivateAddons()
+      let g:vim_addon_manager = {}
+      let g:vim_addon_manager.log_to_buf =1
+      set runtimepath+=~/.vim/vim-addons/vim-addon-manager
+      call vam#ActivateAddons([])
+    endf
+    call ActivateAddons()
+    EOF
+    }
+
+IMHO having no plugins listed might be better than having outdated ones.
+
+So which plugins to add here according to what Marc Weber thinks is best?
+complicated plugins requiring dependencies, such as YouCompleteMe.
+Then its best to symlink ~/.nix-profile/vim-plugins/YouCompleteMe to
+~/.vim/{vim-addons,bundle} or whatever plugin management solution you use.
+
+If you feel differently change the comments and proceed.
+*/
+
+let vimHelptags = path: ''
+  ${vim}/bin/vim -N -u NONE -i NONE -n -e -s -c "helptags ${path}" +quit!
+'';
+
+in
+
+{
+
+  #TODO :helptags should be run
+
+  vimAddonNix = {
+    # github.com/MarcWeber/vim-addon-nix provides some additional support for
+    # editing .nix files
+
+    # This is a placeholder, because I think you always should be using latest git version
+  };
+
+  YouCompleteMe = stdenv.mkDerivation {
+    # REGION AUTO UPDATE: { name="youcompleteme"; type="git"; url="git://github.com/Valloric/YouCompleteMe"; }
+    src = (fetchurl { url = "http://mawercer.de/~nix/repos/youcompleteme-git-97306.tar.bz2"; sha256 = "b9b892f5a723370c2034491dc72a4ca722c6cf1e5de4d60501141bba151bc719"; });
+    name = "youcompleteme-git-97306";
+    # END
+    buildInputs = [ python cmake ];
+
+    configurePhase = ":";
+
+    buildPhase = ''
+      set -x
+      target=$out/vim-plugins/YouCompleteMe
+      mkdir -p $target
+      cp -a ./ $target
+
+      mkdir $target/build
+      cd $target/build
+      cmake -G "Unix Makefiles" . $target/cpp -DPYTHON_LIBRARIES:PATH=${python}/lib/libpython2.7.so -DPYTHON_INCLUDE_DIR:PATH=${python}/include/python2.7
+      make -j -j''${NIX_BUILD_CORES} -l''${NIX_BUILD_CORES}}
+
+      ${vimHelptags "$out/vim-plugins/YouCompleteMe/doc"}
+    '';
+
+    # TODO: implement proper install phase rather than keeping everything in store
+    # TODO: support llvm based C completion, See README of git repository
+    installPhase = ":";
+
+    meta = {
+      description = "fastest non utf-8 aware word and C completion engine for Vim";
+      homepage = http://github.com/Valloric/YouCompleteMe;
+      license = stdenv.lib.licenses.gpl3;
+      maintainers = [stdenv.lib.maintainers.marcweber];
+      platforms = stdenv.lib.platforms.linux;
+    };
+  };
+
+}
diff --git a/pkgs/top-level/all-packages.nix b/pkgs/top-level/all-packages.nix
index 6d1a47b29e86..bfbda334991c 100644
--- a/pkgs/top-level/all-packages.nix
+++ b/pkgs/top-level/all-packages.nix
@@ -8095,7 +8095,7 @@ let
 
   vimHugeX = vim_configurable;
 
-  vim_configurable = import ../applications/editors/vim/configurable.nix {
+  vim_configurable = callPackage (import ../applications/editors/vim/configurable.nix) {
     inherit (pkgs) fetchurl stdenv ncurses pkgconfig gettext composableDerivation lib config;
     inherit (pkgs.xlibs) libX11 libXext libSM libXpm libXt libXaw libXau libXmu libICE;
     inherit (pkgs) glib gtk;
@@ -8108,6 +8108,8 @@ let
     # optional features by flags
     flags = [ "python" "X11" ]; # only flag "X11" by now
   };
+  vimLatest = vim_configurable.override { source = "latest"; };
+  vimNox = vim_configurable.override { source = "vim-nox"; };
 
   virtviewer = callPackage ../applications/virtualization/virt-viewer {};
   virtmanager = callPackage ../applications/virtualization/virt-manager {
@@ -9274,6 +9276,8 @@ let
 
   viewnior = callPackage ../applications/graphics/viewnior { };
 
+  vimPlugins = callPackage ../misc/vim-plugins { };
+
   vimprobable2 = callPackage ../applications/networking/browsers/vimprobable2 {
     inherit (gnome) libsoup;
     webkit = webkit_gtk2;