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vim-commands.md

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Vim Commands:

This information is partially taken from here

References

General

  • Nearly all commands can be preceded by a number for a repeat count. eg. 5dd deletes 5 lines
  • Esc gets you out of any mode and back to command mode
  • Commands preceded by : are executed on the command line at the bottom of the screen
  • :help helps with any command
  • Note: The key for productivity in Vim is to stay most of the time in NORMAL mode, and use from there all the available commands to modify text and move around.

Navigation

  • Cursor movement: ←h ↓j ↑k l→

  • By words:

    NOTE: 'words' are letters and the underscore character, while 'WORDS' are characters separated by blanks. For instance, in the following line:

      (name_1,vision_3; # this is a comment.

Here the first 'word' is name_1, while the first 'WORD' is (name_1,vision_3;

  • w next word (by punctuation)

  • W next WORD (by spaces)

  • b back word (by punctuation)

  • B back WORD (by spaces)

  • e end word (by punctuation)

  • E end WORD (by spaces)

  • * goes to the NEXT occurence of the word under the cursor

  • # goes to the PREVIOUS occurence of the word under the cursor

  • By line:

    • 0 goes to first column
    • ^ goes to first NON-BLANK character of the line
    • $ goes to end of line
    • g_ goes to the last NON-BLANK character of the line
    • g; goes to place of last insertion
    • fX goes to the NEXT occurence of character X on the line
      • ; will find the NEXT occurrence
      • , will find the PREVIOUS occurrence
    • 3fX finds the third occurence of character X on this line
    • tX goes to just BEFORE character X
    • F and T are like f and t, but BACKWARDS
    • dtX removes everything from here to just before X

  • By paragraph:

    • { previous blank line
    • } next blank line

  • By file:

    • gg goes to start of file
    • G goes to end of file
    • 123G goes to specific line number ('123' in this case)

  • By marker:

    • mx sets bookmark x
    • 'x goes to bookmark x
    • '. goes to position of last edit
    • '' goes back to last point before jump
    • :marks shows all bookmarks
    • :delm x deletes bookmark x
    • :delm! deletes all bookmarks

  • Scrolling:

    • ^F forward full screen
    • ^B backward full screen
    • ^D down half screen
    • ^U up half screen
    • ^E scroll one line up
    • ^Y scroll one line down
    • zt puts current line at the Top of the screen
    • zz puts current line in the center of the screen
    • zb puts current line at the Bottom of the screen
    • H puts the cursor to the Highest line of the screen
    • M puts the cursor to the Middle line of the screen
    • L puts the cursor to the Lower line of the screen

Editing

  • u undo
  • ^R redo
  • . repeats last editing command
  • N<command> repeats N times (p.e. 100idesu [ESC] inserts 'desu ' 100 times
  • N. repeats last editing command N times

Inserting

All insertion commands are terminated with Esc to return to command mode.

  • i inserts text AT CURSOR
  • I inserts text at START OF LINE
  • a appends text AFTER CURSOR
  • A appends text AFTER END OF LINE
  • o opens new line BELOW
  • O opens new line ABOVE

Changing

All change commands except r and R are terminated with Esc to return to command mode.

  • r replaces single character
  • R replaces multiple characters
  • s changes single character
  • cw changes from the cursor to end of the word
  • C changes to end of line
  • cc changes whole line
  • c<motion> changes text in the direction of the motion
  • ci( changes inside parentheses (see text object selection for more examples)

Deleting

  • x deletes char
  • dw deletes word
  • D deletes to end of line
  • dd deletes whole line
  • d<motion> deletes in the direction of the motion

Cut and paste

  • yy copies line into paste buffer
  • dd cuts line into paste buffer
  • p pastes buffer BELOW cursor line
  • P pastes buffer ABOVE cursor line
  • xp swaps two characters (x to delete one character, then p to put it back after the cursor position)
  • ]p pastes with auto-reindent

Blocks

  • v visual block stream
  • V visual block line
  • ^v visual block column
    • most motion commands extend the block to the new cursor position
    • o move the cursor to the other end of the block
  • d or x cuts block into paste buffer
  • y copies block into paste buffer
  • > indents block
  • < unindents block
  • gv reselects last visual block
  • :sort sorts selected rows
  • U converts selected text to uppercase
  • u converts selected text to lowercase
  • ~ inverts case of selected text

Buffers

  • :ls shows list of buffers
  • :bX changes to buffer number X
  • :bn shows next file (buffer)
  • :bp shows previous file (buffer)
  • :bd close current buffer and delete it from buffer list

Global

  • :%s/foo/bar/g substitutes all occurrences of "foo" to "bar" IN WHOLE FILE
  • :%s/foo/bar/gc substitutes all occurrences of "foo" to "bar" IN WHOLE FILE, with a prompt whether to substitute or not.
  • :#,#s/old/new/g where #,# are the line numbers of the range of lines where the substitution is to be done.
  • % is a range that indicates every line in the file
  • /g is a flag that changes all occurrences on a line instead of just the first one

Searching

  • / searches FORWARD
  • ? searches BACKWARD
  • * searches FORWARD for word under cursor
  • # searches BACKWARD for word under cursor
  • n next match in SAME direction
  • N next match in OPPOSITE direction
  • fX forward to NEXT character X
  • FX backward to PREVIOUS character X
  • ; moves again to same character in SAME direction
  • , moves again to same character in OPPOSITE direction
  • /word\c ignores case for just one search command
  • :set ic sets the 'ignore case' option ('ignorecase')
  • :set hls sets highlighting of matches ('hlsearch')
  • :set is shows partial matching phrases ('incsearch')
  • :nohlsearch removes the highlighting of matches
  • Prepend "no" to switch an option off. For instance: :set noic

Files

  • :w writes file to disk
  • :w <filename> writes file to disk as filename
  • :x writes file to disk and quit (only save if necessary)
  • ZZ writes file to disk and quit
  • :enew opens a new buffer to edit a new file
  • :n! edits a new file without saving current changes
  • :q quits editing a file
  • :q! quits editing without saving changes
  • :qa! quits even if there are modified hidden buffers
  • :e edits same file again (if changed outside Vim)
  • :e . directory explorer
  • :e <FILENAME> opens FILENAME
  • :saveas <path/to/file> saves to path/to/file
  • v <motion> :w FILENAME saves the visually selected lines to FILENAME
  • :r FILENAME retrieves FILENAME and puts it below the cursor position
  • :r !command reads output of command and puts it below cursor position

Windows

  • ^Wn new window
  • ^Wj down to next window
  • ^Wk up to previous window
  • ^W_ maximises current window
  • ^W= makes all windows equal size
  • ^W+ increases window size
  • ^W- decreases window size

Source Navigation

  • % jumps to matching parenthesis/bracket/brace, or language block if language module loaded
  • gd goes to definition of local symbol under cursor
  • Ctrl-O returns to previous position
  • Ctrl-] jumps to definition of global symbol (requires tags file)
  • Ctrl-T returns to previous position (arbitrary stack of positions maintained)
  • Ctrl-N (in insert mode) automatic word completion

Other:

  • qa -> records your actions in register 'a'
  • @a -> this will call the macro saved in register 'a'
  • @@ -> calls the last executed macro
  • Ctrl-j window down
  • Ctrl-k window up
  • Ctrl-l window right
  • Ctrl-h window left
  • zm opens search result in a new window
  • <F5> switches between themes
  • Ctrl-P Super searching
  • <space> (or za): Folding code
  • :sp <filename> splits the layout horizontally (:split)
  • :vs <filename> splits the layout vertically (:vsplit)
  • :tabedit opens a new empty tab
  • :!<command> executes an external command
  • :help <topic> provides help about topic
  • Ctrl-W Ctrl-W jumps between windows
  • In command mode (:e), Ctrl-D shows a list of commands that start with "e"
  • Most commands can be used with the following general format:
      <START-position><COMMAND><END-position>

For example, 0y$ means:

  • 0 goes to the beggining of this line
  • y yanks from here...
  • $ ...up to the end of this line

So, ye means 'yank from here to the end of the word'

Another example is y2/foo: 'yank up to the second occurrence of "foo"'

Also:

  • gU$ changes to uppercase from here to the end of the line

  • guw changes to lowercase from here to the beginning of next word

  • d3w deletes from here to the beginnning of the third word

  • :hardcopy sends file to printer (but format is not very good)

  • :retab converts tabs to spaces

  • :shell launches a shell console from Vim

  • Ctrl-d comes back from the console to Vim

  • :colorscheme emacs changes the color scheme to emacs

  • <F8>/Shift-<F8> changes to next/previous color scheme (setcolors plugin)

  • SetColors [all|my|blues slate ron|emacs] displays current scheme names or sets scheme names to specific list (setcolors plugin)

Show local changes

Vim has some features that make it easy to highlight lines that have been changed from a base version in source control. Greg Hewgill has created a small Vim script that makes this easy.