VIM survival and beyond cheatsheet

vim_survival_cheat.md

VIM survival and beyond cheatsheet

To brush up beginner knowledge: run vimtutor

Bare minimum

a.k.a. I hate vim but I'm forced to use it:

Everything here starts in "normal mode"!

• some commands bring you in "insert mode"
  • Press i to insert text before cursor, insert some text, finish with ESC
• colon brings you to "command mode"
  • enter :w<enter> to save file
  • :q<enter> to quit without saving
  • :q!<enter> to quit, abandoning changes
• If unsure which mode your're in, ESC brings you back to normal mode

Essential movements

• hjkl character-by-character
• ^f ^b page-wise up/down
• G gg bottom/top line

Poisoned fruit: you can use arrow keys instead of hjkl. Avoid them!

Basic editing

• we have already seen i

• To insert at the end of line: A

• x and X to delete char after/before cursor

• dd to delete whole line

• J to join line to next one

That's it, the bare minimum to get things done.

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Beyond survival

This + that (1)

• u and C^R are undo/redo, but only one step unless configured
  • :help undo
• D/C deletes/changes from cursor to end of line

Yanking and pasting

This feature is closest to the "clipboard":

Yanking saves text in a "register". Deleting saves the deleted text in a register.

• y + motion, d + motion.
• yy and dd yank/delete a line
• p / P paste the yanked/deleted text
  • before/after the cursor
  • when yanked/deleted line-wise, on previous/next line

Visual modes

• v, V (linewise), C^V (block-wise)
• then motions to move the boundary
• o (and O in block-wise) to switch boundary
• finally, a command like c, d, y (insert/delete/yank). Or ESC.

More movements

:help motion.txt will blow your mind!

• "find": f<letter> and F<letter> move to next/prev <letter> on line
• "till": same with t and T, but stop right before letter
• w b move to beginning of next /end of previous word
• W B same fo WORDs (white-space separated text)
• H M L jump to top/middle/bottom of current screen of text
• % jumps to matching bracket (of any kind)
• <number>G go to this line
• 0 and $ go to beginning (non-whitespace) and end of line
• ( ) sentence forward/back
• [ ] paragraph forward/back
• / regular-expression search (vim has its own flavour!)

Regularities and grammar

• yy cc dd are line-wise

visual_editing_operation: v (motion)* operator
editing-operation: ([register] [repetition] operator [force] [repetition] (motion | text-object)) | visual-editing-operation
text-object: object | (a or i)

• Register: for yanking and pasting, which register to use instead of default. :help registers
• Repetition: how many times
• Force: v V C^V force character-, line-, blockwise mode
• a is "around", i "inside" mode
  • for text objects defined by delimiters: with vs. without them
  • for all others: with or without trailing whitespace

Editing operations can be repeated with the powerful and simple .. Typical:

1. do a search
2. do editing operation
3. repeat search
4. decide whether to apply op here too
5. repeat at (2) or (3)

(Text) objects

:help text-objects

These are the objects (without leading a/i)

• w W s p words WORDs sentences paragraphs
• text quoted in single, double quotes or backticks
• brackets (all four kinds)
  • SUPER USEFUL in programming b/c nesting aware
• t HTML/XML tags

In visual mode, text objects (with a/i) extend the selection.

This + that (2)

:set [no]<feature> sets/unsets flags:

• feature=number: line numbering
• feature=hls|hlsearch search result highighting
• feature=paste past mode: disables some syntax rules for pasting as-is from clipboard

Insert mode goodies

• C^R" paste previous yank (unless line-wise)
  • example: ce(C^R")ESC wraps word in brackets
• C^N auto-completion from several sources
  • C^N/C^P ... then <enter> if menu pops up
• C^XC^L completes line: massive time-saver!
• C^XC^O "omni-completion" (needs language integration)
• C^XC^F complete file path

Where to go from here

• to get a comprehensive understanding of vim: :help user-manual
• to get a good overview of features and discover more motions and bindings, check out this awesome cheat sheet