Vim Notes

Vim can be downloaded from vim.org. The Windows installer is a self-extracting archive which does not require administrator privileges to run (as long as you have permission to write to the selected install folder).

You can find help here:

Intro

Vim is modal

Normal mode maps each key to an editing command
Insert mode is used to enter text

GVim is Vim in a GUI.
- a GUI terminal might intercept keystrokes that it understands; GVim only understands Vim commands.
EVim is GVim in "easy mode".
Easy mode can also be run using vim -y in the terminal
Easy mode can also be activated using the Vim command :set insertmode. This also works in the command-line Vim. (see :help evim-keys for the full list of options that EVim uses).
There are also "View" variants that open the file read-only

In Vim/GVim, the program starts in Normal mode; use i to enter Insert mode and ESC to return to Normal mode
In EVim, the program starts in Insert mode; use CTRL-L to enter Normal mode and ESC or i to return to Insert mode

When in Normal mode, use : to enter the Vim command-line
Use :w [filename] to save a file
- To save a file under a different name without overwriting the original, use :saveas [filename]
Use :q to quit Vim
Use :q! to quit Vim without saving changes
Use :wq or ZZ to save and close
Use :help to read Vim's help

Undo/Redo

u undoes the previous command
CTRL-R redoes the last undo

Inserting

i enters Insert mode at the current position
a enters Insert mode after the current position
I enters Insert mode at the beginning of the line
A enters Insert mode at the end of the line
o inserts a new line below the current line and enters insert mode on the new line
O inserts a new line above the current line and enters insert mode on the new line
R enters Replace / overtype mode; typed characters replace existing ones
c followed by a motion deletes text and enters Insert mode (effectively d followed by i)
Esc returns to Normal mode

Note that everything from when Insert mode is first entered to pressing ESC is treated as one command, and therefore one item on the undo stack. For that reason, I usually use o to enter newlines so that each line is a separate command and a separate item on the undo stack.

Motions

Motions move the cursor around. Most commands can be followed by a motion to indicate the affected text.

When in Normal mode, use h, j, k, and l to move the cursor
- h is on the left and moves the cursor left
- l is on the right and moves the cursor right
- j looks like a down arrow and moves the cursor down
- k moves the cursor up
Normally, only j and k are used; there are faster ways to move around

w moves the cursor to the beginning of the next word
e moves the cursor to the end of the next word
b moves the cursor to the beginning of the previous word
Lowercase w, e, and b treat whitespace and punctuation as word separators; Uppercase W, E, and B only treat whitespace as separators (punctuation is considered part of the word)

f followed by a character goes forward (right) to the next character (e.g. fg goes to the next g)
F followed by a character goes back (left) to the previous character (e.g. Fg goes to the previous g)
f or F prefixed with a number goes to the nth character (e.g. 2fr goes to the 2nd r after the cursor)

0 jumps to the beginning of the line
^ jumps to the first non-whitespace character of the line
$ jumps to the end of the line

H moves the cursor to the highest visible line (on the screen)
L moves the cursor to the lowest visible line
M moves the cursor to the middle of the screen

gg moves to the beginning of the document
- Prefixed with a number, goes to the nth line (e.g. 20gg goes to line 20)
G moves to the end of the document

{ and } jump over paragraphs. A paragraph is any block of text separated by a blank line

% scans forward for a grouping character and jumps to the matching character

Editing

For nearly all editing commands, repeating the command character operates on the line under the cursor (e.g. dd deletes the line, yy copies the line, etc.).

d followed by a motion will delete characters (placing them in the default register)
D will delete characters from the current cursor position to the end of the line (shortcut for d$)
y followed by a motion will copy (yank) characters into the default register
Y will copy (yank) the current line into the default register (shortcut for yy)
p will put the contents of the default register after the cursor
P will put the contents of the default register before the cursor
- The above commands can be prefixed with " followed by a register letter to operate on a specific register (e.g. "add will delete the line and place it in register a; "ap will then paste this register)
  - Also, with y and d, using a captial register letter will append to the register instad of overwriting it
- Also note that the special register + synchronizes with the system clipboard (e.g. "+p will paste the clipboard contents; "+yy will copy a line to the clipboard)
x will delete the character under the cursor
> followed by a motion indents the lines indicated by the motion
< followed by a motion un-indents the lines indicated by the motion
. repeats the last command

Navigating Help

use :help to view Vim's help
use :help <topic> to jump to a topic
You may notice some help text that is highlighted. These are tags. Position the cursor on the text and press CTRL-] to jump to the tagged topic. Use CTRL-T to return to the previous topic.
use :helpgrep <text> to search for <text> in the help
- use :cn to go to the next search result
  - You can use @: to repeat the :cn command

Searching

/ allows to search for the next occurrence of a regex
? allows to search for the previous occurrence of a regex
n repeats the previous search in the same direction
N repeats the previous search in the opposite direction

* jumps to the next occurrence of the identifier under the cursor
# jumps to the previous occurrence of the identifier under the cursor

Scrolling

CTRL-F scrolls down one screen
CTRL-B scrolls up one screen
zt places the current line at the top of the screen
zb places the current line at the bottom of the screen
zz places the current line at the middle of the screen
- (This is not the same as ZZ, which saves and quits Vim)

Marks

You can mark a location in a file and return to it later. Every buffer has its own set of lowercase marks. Uppercase marks are global and can be used to jump between files.

m followed by a letter sets a mark at the cursor position (e.g. ma sets mark a)
' followed by a letter jumps to the mark

Completion

When in Insert mode, use CTRL-P to quickly enter words that appear elsewhere in the document. Use CTRL-P and CTRL-N to scroll through the list. Use CTRL-Y to accept ("yes") or CTRL-E to cancel ("escape" or "exit").

When in Insert mode, use CTRL-X to enter Insert mode completion. See :help ins-completion.

Useful subcommands:

CTRL-X CTRL-F: Filename completion.
CTRL-X CTRL-K: Completion from one or more dictionary files (see :help dictionary).
CTRL-X CTRL-T: Completion from one or more thesaurus files (see :help thesaurus).
CTRL-X CTRL-S or CTRL-X s: If spelling is enabled, complete spelling suggestions.
CTRL-X CTRL-]: Tag completion.
CTRL-X CTRL-O: Omni-complete. This allows for completion based on filetype. See :help compl-omni-filetypes.
When the popup menu is displayed, use CTRL-N and CTRL-P to scroll through the list. You can also repeat the subcommand (e.g. CTRL-F for file completion) as a shortcut for CTRL-N.
CTRL-Y: Accept completion.
CTRL-E: Cancel completion.

Spell Checking

The command :setlocal spell spelllang=en_us enables spell checking. Spell files for other languages can be placed in ~/.vim/spell (UNIX) or %USERPROFILE%\vimfiles\spell (Windows).

Use the following commands with the spell checker:

]s goes to the next misspelled word
[s goes to the previous misspelled word
z= suggests correctly spelled words for the word under the cursor.
In Insert mode, use CTRL-X CTRL-S or CTRL-X s to find spelling suggestions.
zg marks a word as "good" (i.e. not misspelled). This will be saved in your spell file.
zG marks a word as good, but does not add it to the spell file. This will be lost when you exit Vim.
zw marks a word as misspelled. This will be saved in your spell file.
zW marks a word as misspelled, but does not add it to the spell file. This will be lost when you exit Vim.
zug/zuG/zuw/zuW undo zg, zG, zw, or zW

Macros

q followed by a register will record all following commands to the register (use q to stop recording)
@ followed by a register will execute the contents of the register as commands
- Prefix @ with a count to execute the macro multiple times.

Note that these commands use the same registers as p, y, and d. This means that you can use qa to record into register a, then "ap to paste the commands entered; or use "ayy to yank a line into register a, then @a to execute it. This ultimately means that you can edit a macro just like any other text, to correct any mistakes made when recording.

Substituting

:s allows for regular expression find-and-replace
& repeats the last :s

:s/red/blue/ replaces the first occurrence of red on the current line with blue
:s/red/blue/g replaces all occurrences of red on the current line with blue
:3,5s/red/blue/g replaces all occurrences of red on lines 3 to 5 with blue
:%s/red/blue/g replaces all occurrences of red in the file with blue
:%s/red/blue/gc asks to confirm each replacement
:%s/emacs//ig deletes (note the empty replacement string) all occurrences of emacs (ignores case)
:s/.*/insert(&);/ wraps the entire line in a function call
:s/$".*"$ *: *$.*$,/mymap->insert(make_pair(\1, \2));/ converts a Python dictionary or JSON object literal to a C++ STL map insert

Note that the separator (the character following s) is / by tradition, but can be (almost) any punctuation character. This is useful if the pattern or replacement contains many / characters (e.g. UNIX path names or URLs). Common alternatives are :, ,, and @.

The following all work:

:s:red:blue:
:s@red@blue@
:s,red,blue,

Visual Mode

Visual mode allows you to easily select text to be manipulated by a command. After entering visual mode, all text between the cursor's current position and the cursor's position when you entered visual mode are operated on.

v starts visual mode in character mode
V starts visual mode in line mode
CTRL-V starts visual mode in block mode
gv starts visual mode with the previously-selected text selected
o goes to the other end of the selected area
O is like o, but in block mode it goes to the opposite corner

The following commands are useful when you have text selected in visual mode.

d deletes the selected text
c changes the selected text
y yanks the selected text
p overwrites the selected text with the contents of the default register
- Note that these commands can be used with " to select a different register
< and > change the indentation of the selected lines
: enters the Vim command line with a prefix so that the executed command operates on the selected text

Text Objects

Text objects are a quick way to select and operate on various types of structured text, such as words, sentences, paragraphs, quoted strings, blocks delimited by any type of bracket or brace, and even XML tags. See :help text-objects.

Buffers and Multiple Files

Vim reads files into a buffer. You can have multiple buffers to open multiple files. You can create new buffers using :hide edit <filename> or :hide enew. By default, every file specified on the command line is read into a separate buffer.

By default, you must write the current buffer before switching to another buffer. You can append a ! to the command to force the switch, but this will cause Vim to forget any changes. :set hidden allows you to switch buffers without losing changes.

:buffers or :ls lists all buffers
:buffer [N] and :b[N] switch to buffer N
:bnext and :bn switch to next buffer
:bprevious and :bp switch to previous buffer
:bunload unloads the current buffer and switches to another one (frees memory)
gf opens the file under the cursor in a new buffer

Windows

Vim's viewport can be split into multiple windows. Each window can display a different buffer. Different windows can also view the same buffer (e.g. to view one part of the file while editing a different part).

The -o command-line option will cause Vim to open a window for each file on the command line. For example, $ vim -o file1 file2 file3 will open Vim with three windows, one each for file1, file2, and file3. You can also specify a number of windows. For example, $ vim -o2 file1 file2 file3 will open Vim with two windows, one for file1 and one for file2. You will have to switch buffers to edit file3.

-O works like -o, except that the windows are split vertically.

:split and CTRL-W CTRL-S and CTRL-W s split the current window in two, horizontally
CTRL-W CTRL-^ and CTRL-W ^ split the current window and edit the alternate file
:sbuffer [N] and :sbuffer {bufname} split the window and edit buffer N or bufname
[N] CTRL-W CTRL-^ and [N] CTRL-W ^ split the current window and edit buffer N
:vsplit and CTRL-W CTRL-V and CTRL-W v split the current window in two, vertically
:new and CTRL-W CTRL-N and CTRL-W n create a new empty window
:vnew creates a new empty window, split vertically
:split file and :new file open file in a new window
CTRL-W CTRL-] and CTRL-W ] split the window and jump to the tag under the cursor
CTRL-W CTRL-F and CTRL-W f split the window and edit the file under the cursor
CTRL-W F splits the window and edits the file and line number under the cursor
:all opens a window for each open file
:quit and CTRL-W CTRL-Q and CTRL-W q close the current window
:only and CTRL-W CTRL-O and CTRL-W o close all windows except the current

CTRL-W CTRL-(HJKL) and CTRL-W (hjkl) move the cursor to another window
CTRL-W = makes all windows equal size
CTRL-W - makes the current window shorter
CTRL-W + makes the current window taller
CTRL-W _ makes the current window as tall as possible
CTRL-W > makes the current window wider
CTRL-W < makes the current window narrower
CTRL-W | makes the current window as wide as possible

See :help windows.txt.

Tab Pages

A tab page holds one or more windows. You can easily switch between tab pages, so that you have several collections of windows to work on different things.

The -p command-line option will cause Vim to open a tab page for each file on the command line.

:tabs lists tab pages and the windows they contain
:tabnew creates a new tab page
:tabedit file opens a file in a new tab page
:tab cmd executes cmd and when it opens a new window open a new tab page instead
:tab all opens a new tab page for each file given on the command line
CTRL-W gf opens a new tab page and edit the file under the cursor
CTRL-W gF opens a new tab page and edit the file and line under the cursor
CTRL-W T moves the current window to a new tab page
:tabclose closes the current tab page
:tabonly closes all other tab pages

:tabnext and gt go to the next tab page
:tabnext {count} and {count}gt go to tab page {count}
:tabprevious and gT go to the previous tab page
:tabprevious {count} and {count}gT go {count} tab pages back

:tabmove [N] moves the current tab page after tab page N
:tabmove +[N] and :tabmove -[N] move the current tab page relative to its current position

See :help tabpage.txt

Vimdiff

Diff mode is used to compare two to four files side-by-side. You can run Vim in diff mode by running vimdiff file1 file2 or vim -d file1 file2. You may also use gvimdiff or vim -d -g. The GUI is started then. You may also use viewdiff or gviewdiff. Vim starts in readonly mode then.

This only works when a standard diff command is available. See :help diffexpr.

See :help diff.txt

Runtime Configuration

When Vim runs, it reads and executes an "rc" file. This file is used to store user settings. By default, this is a file called .vimrc or _vimrc in your $HOME folder. (Run :help .vimrc for more info on where Vim searches for this file).

There are many settings which can be overridden in the rc file, including :set options and key bindings. If filetype detection is enabled, then you can use the :autocmd command to set filetype-specific settings.

When running GVim or EVim, they will also load the .gvimrc (after loading the .vimrc). This can be used for GUI-specific startup commands (e.g. disabling the mouse).

I have included excerpts of my .vimrc and .gvimrc files for reference.

Filetypes

Vim can perform syntax coloring/highlighting for various file types. To enable this, run the command :syntax enable. This will keep your current color settings, which can be changed with :highlight. If you want Vim to overrule your color settings, use :syntax on. It may be useful to have one of these in your .vimrc.

The filetype option allows Vim to customize settings for various types of files. Use :filetype on to enable filetype detection. With filetype detection enabled, you can register autocommands to execute when certain types of files are loaded. This is done using :autocmd (and is often done in your .vimrc).

Vim indentation plugins are used to load different automatic indentation settings based on the file type. Use :filetype indent on to enable this.

Vim filetype plugins are used to load settings and key bindings for specific file types. To enable loading plugins, use :filetype plugin on.

You can combine filetype detection, plugin settings, and indentation settings using :filetype plugin indent on.

You can install new syntax, filetype, and indentation settings in the folder ~/.vim/ (UNIX) or %USERPROFILE%\vimfiles (Windows).

Note that filetype plugins will override settings in your .vimrc. You can over-override your plugins with plugins stored in ~/.vim/after/ (UNIX) or %USERPROFILE%\vimfiles\after (Windows).

The :filetype detect command will cause Vim to detect the filetype of the current file (if you opened an empty file and started writing).

QuickFix Mode

QuickFix mode enables Vim to parse the output of programs and open the files and lines mentioned in the output. The most common use is to parse compiler errors and jump to the offending lines.

You can save the compiler output and start Vim using the -q option:

$ g++ *.cpp > errors.txt || echo "there were errors, see errors.txt"
$ vim -q errors.txt

An easier way to do this is to use the :make command. See Compiling Code below.

The errorformat option should be set to match the error messages from your compiler (see :help errorformat).

:cc displays and jumps to the current error message
:cnext displays and jumps to the next error message
:cprevious displays and jumps to the previous error message
:clist lists all recognized errors
:clist! lists all errors (this will also contain context from the compiler output)
:copen opens a new window containing the list of errors (this will also contain context from the compiler output). Press <Enter> to jump to the error under the cursor.
- CTRL-W <Enter> opens a new window and jumps to the error there
- :cclose closes the quickfix window
:cfile re-reads the error file and jumps to the first error
:cfile filename reads error file filename
:cgetfile [filename] is like :cfile, but does not jump to the first error
:cquit quits Vim with an error code, so that the compiler can abort (if the compiler opened Vim to correct the errors)

See :help quickfix.txt

Compiling Code

The :make command can be used to compile programs. The name comes from Make, but you can use other build tools. To do so, set the makeprg option to the name of your build tool (e.g. :set makeprg=ant) (This is best done using :autocmd in your .vimrc) (You could also write a Makefile so make can run your compiler, which is what make is for).

Running :make will cause Vim to save the output and enter quickfix mode. Make sure you set errorformat before running :make (e.g. in your .vimrc, or via a compiler plugin).

See :help :make_makeprg

Compiler Plugins

Compiler plugins are used to set the makeprg and errorformat options for specific compilers. You can install new compiler settings in the folder ~/.vim/compiler (UNIX) or %USERPROFILE%\vimfiles\compiler (Windows).

Use :compiler name to load a compiler plugin.

See :help compiler-select

Browsing Folders

Vim includes a standard plugin for browsing folders. To use it, simply edit a folder (e.g. by specifying a folder name on the command-line or using :edit). This plugin can also be used to browse FTP sites and network shares (the URL must end with a /).

:Explore opens the directory containing the current file. If the file has unsaved changes, the directory will open in a new window.
:Explore {dir} opens the directory containing dir. If the current file has unsaved changes, the directory will open in a new window.
:Sexplore always opens the directory in a new window
:Lexplore always opens the directory in a new window on the left side of the tab page
:Texplore always opens the directory in a new tab page
:Rexplore toggles between the previously-viewed file and the previously-viewed directory

The above commands (except :Rexplore) can also be given a pattern for searching for files. See :help netrw-star. Use :Nexplore and :Pexplore or SHIFT-<Down> and SHIFT-<Up> to scroll through the list of matches.

<Enter> makes Vim enter the directory or edit the file under the cursor
o enters the file/directory in a new window
P enters the file/directory in the last used window
v enters the file/directory in a new window, using a vertical split
t enters the file/directory in a new tab page
u goes to the previous directory

s changes the sorting style (by name, by time, by size)
r reverses the sorting order

R renames a file or directory
d creates a new directory
D attempts to delete a file or directory

i cycles between thin, long, wide, and tree listings
c makes the viewed directory Vim's current directory (i.e. it makes Vim :cd into that directory)
CTRL-L refreshes the directory listing
qf displays information on the file under the cursor

See :help netrw-browse and :help pi_netrw.txt

Name		Name	Last commit message	Last commit date
Latest commit History 14 Commits
.gvimrc		.gvimrc
.vimrc		.vimrc
README.md		README.md

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Vim Notes

Contents

Intro

Undo/Redo

Inserting

Motions

Editing

Navigating Help

Searching

Scrolling

Marks

Tags

Completion

Spell Checking

Macros

Substituting

Visual Mode

Text Objects

Buffers and Multiple Files

Windows

Tab Pages

Vimdiff

Runtime Configuration

Filetypes

QuickFix Mode

Compiling Code

Compiler Plugins

Browsing Folders

About

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dragon0/vimnotes

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Vim Notes

Contents

Intro

Undo/Redo

Inserting

Motions

Editing

Navigating Help

Searching

Scrolling

Marks

Tags

Completion

Spell Checking

Macros

Substituting

Visual Mode

Text Objects

Buffers and Multiple Files

Windows

Tab Pages

Vimdiff

Runtime Configuration

Filetypes

QuickFix Mode

Compiling Code

Compiler Plugins

Browsing Folders

About

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