Vim

Sep 13, 2019

Concept

Vim is a command and mode based editor, so everything can be done with various commands(operator and motion) in different modes. And for each file opened by Vim, there is a buffer. Vim shows everything to you with windows and tabs.

Operator and Motion

there are two kind of commands in Vim: Operator and Motion.

Operator commands are generally used to delete or change text.
Motion commands are used to move the cursor position.

Modes

Vim is always in a specify mode, e.g. once you open a file with vi file.txt you are in Normal mode by default, then type i you switch to Insert mode, with a ⎋Escape you switch back to Normal mode again.

Operator

Cheat sheet for Operator commands.

Operator	Describe
`d`	Delete
`y`	Yank(copy)
`c`	Change(delete then insert)
`>`	Indent right
`«/kbd>`	Indent left
`~`	swap case (only if ‘tildeop’ is set)
`g~`	Swap case
`gU`	Uppercase
`gu`	Lowercase
`!`	Filter through external program
`=`	Filter through ‘equalprg’ or C-indenting if empty
`gq`	Text formatting
`gw`	Text formatting with no cursor movement
`g?`	ROT13 encoding
`zf`	Define a fold
`g@`	Call function set with the ‘operatorfunc’ option

Motion

Motion commands: move/jump cursor between lines or files, select lines.

Left-Right motions

Left-Right motions	Describe
`h`	[count] characters to the left
`l`	[count] characters to the right
`0`	To the first character of the line
`^`	To the first non-blank character of the line
`$`	To the end of the line
`g_`	To the last non-blank character of the line
`g0`	To the first character of the screen line
`g^`	To the first non-blank character of the scren line
`g$`	To the last character of the screen line
`f{char}`	To [count]‘th occurrence of {char} to the right
`F{char}`	To the [count]‘th occurrence of {char} to the left
`t{char}`	Till before [count]‘th occurrence of {char} to the right
`T{char}`	Till after [count]‘th occurrence of {char} to the left
`;`	Repeat latest f, t, F or T [count] times
`,`	Repeat latest f, t, F or T in opposite direction [count] times

Up-Down motions

Up-Down motions	Describe
`j`	[count] lines downward linewise
`k`	[count] lines upward linewise
`⌃Controlu`	page up
`⌃Controld`	page down
`gk`	[count] display(screen) lines upward
`gj`	[count] display(screen) lines downward
`G`	Goto line [count], default last line
`gg`	Goto line [count], default first line
`:[range]`	Set the cursor on the last line number in [range]
`{count}%`	Go to {count} percentage in the file
`H`	Goto first screen line
`L`	Goto last screen line
`M`	Goto to middle screen line

Word motions

Word motions	Describe
`w`	[count] words forward
`e`	Forward to the end of word [count]
`b`	[count] words backward
`ge`	Backward to the end of word
`*`	Goto search for the next occurrence

Text object motions

Text object motions	Describe
`(`	[count] sentences backward
`)`	[count] sentences forward
`{`	[count] paragraphs backward
`}`	[count] paragraphs forward
`%`	move to matching character (default supported pairs: `()` `{}` `[]`. use `:h matchpairs` in vim for more info)

Text object selection

Text object selection commands can only be used while in Visual mode or after an operator.

Text object selection	Describe
`aw`	“a word”, select [count] words
`iw`	“inner word”, select [count] words
`as`	“a sentence”, select [count] sentences
`is`	“inner sentence”, select [count] sentences
`ap`	“a paragraph”, select [count] paragraphs
`ip`	“inner paragraph”, select [count] paragraphs
`a]`	“a [] block”, select [count] ‘[’ ‘]’ blocks
`i]`	“inner [] block”, select [count] ‘[’ ‘]’ blocks
`ab`	“a () block”, select [count] blocks
`ib`	“inner () block”, select [count] blocks
`a>`	“a <> block”, select [count] <> blocks
`i>`	“inner <> block”, select [count] <> blocks
`at`	“a `<tag></tag>` block”, select [count] tag blocks
`it`	“inner `<tag></tag>` block”, select [count] tag blocks
`aB`	“a {} block”, select [count] blocks
`iB`	“inner {} block”, select [count] blocks
`a'`	‘a quoted string’. Selects the text bettwen quotes
`i'`	Like a’, but exclude the quotes
`a"`	“a quoted string”. Selects the text bettwen quotes
`i"`	Like a”, but exclude the quotes
`a``	`a quoted string`. Selects the text bettwen quotes
`i``	Like a`, but exclude the quotes \|

Jump motions

Jump between lines and files. Use m to set a mark.

Marks	Describe
`m{a-z}`	Set mark with name {a-z} the current file(jump only in current file)
`m{A-Z0-9}`	Set mark with name {A-Z0-9} in global(jump between mutilple files)
`gf`	This is not a mark but you can open file under cursor with it

Jumping to a mark can be done in two ways: `{mark name} or '{mark name}

with `: The cursor is positioned at the specified location.
with ': The cursor is positioned on the first non-blank character in the line.

:help motion.txt

Navigate

Key	Describe
`⌃Controlo`	jump cursor position history back
`⌃Controli`	jump cursor position history forward

Modes

Total 14 modes(7 basic modes, 7 additional modes) in Vim for now, but usually I just use part of them(5 basic modes, 4 additonal modes).

Basic modes

Normal mode: run most of Vim commands in the mode
Visual mode: like normal mode but extend a highlighted area
Command-line mode: run search/filter/external/Ex commands
Insert mode: insert text(to buffer), input your contents in this mode
Terminal job mode: run terminal with a terminal window

Additional modes

Insert Normal mode: Enter ⌃Ctrlo in Insert mode, then it's just like Normal mode but after executing one command it returns to Insert mode
Insert Visual mode: Enter ⌃Ctrlo v in Insert mode, then it's just like Visual mode but returns to Insert mode when the Visual selection ends
Replace mode: Like Insert mode but for each character you enter, one characte of the existing text is deleted
Operator pending mode: Like Normal mode but after an operator command has started, and Vim is waiting for a {motion} to specify text that the operator will work on

:help vim-modes

Diagram is easy to show how to switch bettwen different modes:

Use ⎋Escape switching back to Normal mode in any other modes.

Normal mode	Describe
`i`	start Insert mode: insert before the cursor
`I`	start Insert mode: insert at the beginning of the line
`a`	start Insert mode: insert (append) after the cursor
`A`	start Insert mode: insert (append) at the end of the line
`s`	start Insert mode: delete character and substitute text
`S`	start Insert mode: delete line and substitute text (same as cc)
`o`	start Insert mode: append (open) a new line below the current line
`O`	start Insert mode: append (open) a new line above the current line
`cc`	start Insert mode: change (replace) entire line
`C`	start Insert mode: change (replace) to the end of the line
`v`	start Visual mode: mark lines, then do a command (like y-yank)
`V`	start Visual mode: mark with linewise, then do a command
`⌃Controlv`	start Visual mode: mark with block, then do a command
`zz`	center cursor on screen
`r`	replace a single character
`gt`	move to the next tab
`⌃ Controla`	increment the next number
`⌃ Controlx`	decrement the next number
`:`	start Command-line mode: run vim command
`/`	start Command-line mode: search for pattern
`?`	start Command-line mode: search backward for pattern
`!`	start Command-line mode: run external command

Insert mode	Describe
`⌃Controlo`	start Insert Normal mode
`⌃Controlo` `v`	start Insert Visual mode

Visual mode	Describe
`"*y`	copy selected content to external clipboard

Command-line mode	Describe
`bn`	switch to next buffer
`bp`	switch to pre buffer
`terminal`	open terminal window
`w`	write buffer to file
`q`	quit vim
`wq`	write buffer to file then quit

complete cheat sheet

Macros

Macros in vim is powerful so much. There are some tips to it.

Macros	Describe
`qa`	record macro a
`q`	stop recording macro
`@a`	run macro a
`@@`	rerun last run macro
`.`	it's not a really macros but looks liek a macros. it repeats the last change you made(or repeat the Operator you used) such as deleting a word/adding new string.

save macros

create macros with name, such as a
copy macros from register to vim config with "{register} e.g. "ap at normal mode to paste macros a
name that macros with a new var: let @d = '...'
use it with @d at the normal mode

apply macros to multiple lines

⇧ Shiftv to select multiple lines in visual mode
: and input normal @a (a is the name of your macros)

Register

Files

window

buffer

tab

args

change list

Search/Find/Replace

Hotkeys

Snippets

Snippets makes life easy. I use ultisnips to manage all snippets.

You can find basic examples for ultisnips with Google (or full doc on github repo) like:

snippets
hello $0
endsnippets

But I want to show you some tips which are more interesting in here.

match with regex

snippet /kbd([a-z0-9A-Z])/ "kbd" ri
<kbd>`!p snip.rv = match.group(1)`</kbd>$0
endsnippet

"/.../ means regex string
"r means Regular expression
"i means In-word expansion
"`!p ...` means Python script

this snippet matches the string like kbda kbdb kbd0 kbdS and complete them to <kbd> tag:

kbda: <kbd>a</kbd>
kbdb: <kbd>b</kbd>
kbd0: <kbd>0</kbd>
kbdS: <kbd>S</kbd>

Surroundings

We use parentheses, brackets, quotes, XML tags a lot when we are coding. so it's necessary to do it more efficiently. I use vim-surround for that. It extends new operator commands for surroundings:

Operator	Describe
`ys`	add new surroundings
`ds`	delete exist surroundings
`cs`	replace exist surroundings

examples:

ysiW": add " to surround current WORD
ds": remove " of current word/WORD/line
cs'": replace current surrond from ' to "