listchars works pretty well. I have this in my .vimrc: set list set listchars=tab:>=,trail:~,extends:>,precedes:<,nbsp:. Edit: you can also configure

listchars works pretty well. I have this in my .vimrc: set list set listchars=tab:>=,trail:~,extends:>,precedes:<,nbsp:. Edit: you can also configure it to use one type of indentation. I use "set expandtab" so that my files are always indented with spaces.