use Syntastic

I'm not sure if I'll stick with this or not, but its default mode of
operation seems to be about the right amount of in-your-face, at least
for the stuff I've tried it on today:  Write the buffer with a syntax
error, and you'll get strong visual indicators of the error along with
the specifics.

Useful for shortcircuiting that part of the cycle where you run the code
before realizing you're missing a paren or whatever.

.vimrc

@@ -20,6 +20,9 @@ set nocompatible
   " really nice file tree:
   Bundle 'scrooloose/nerdtree'
 
+  " syntax checking
+  Bundle 'scrooloose/syntastic'
+
   " align text vertically on a string:
   Bundle 'Align'
 
@@ -169,6 +172,10 @@ au BufRead,BufNewFile *.t set filetype=php
   " reformat a paragraph
   nmap <leader>q gqip
 
+  " jump to next, previous errors
+  nmap <leader>n :cnext<CR>
+  nmap <leader>p :cprev<CR>
+
   " write all changed buffers
   nmap <leader>w :wa<CR>
 
@@ -190,7 +197,7 @@ au BufRead,BufNewFile *.t set filetype=php
   map <C-S-Tab> :tabprevious<CR>
   map <C-Tab> :tabnext<CR>
   imap <C-S-Tab> <Esc>:tabprevious<CR>i
-  imap <C-Tab> <Esc>:tabnext<CR>i       
+  imap <C-Tab> <Esc>:tabnext<CR>i
   " new tab:
   nmap <leader>tn :tabnew<CR>
 
@@ -198,7 +205,9 @@ au BufRead,BufNewFile *.t set filetype=php
   nmap <leader>f :FufFile<CR>
 
   " check PHP syntax - TODO: expand to syntax check [whatever filetype]
-  noremap <leader>c :!php -l %<CR>
+  " note that this is probably replaced by using Syntastic
+  " noremap <leader>c :echom system('php -l ' . bufname('%'))<CR>
+  noremap <leader>c :SyntasticCheck<CR>
 
   " display tabs - ,s will toggle (redraws just in case)
   nmap <silent> <leader>s :set nolist!<CR>:redr<CR>