vim
Quick reference of VIM commands that I either use often or would like to remember. Will be updated constantly and is of dubious use to anybody else besides me - there are much more complete references on the webternet. I think that creating a personalized cheatsheet of commands is the best way to learn VIM - you can always look a command up if you happen to forget it, but at the same time you wouldn't have to sift through commands that you never use.
Movement
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| gg | start of the buffer |
| G | end of the buffer |
| 5G | jump to line 5 in the buffer |
| 5gg | same as 5G above |
| <Enter> | first non-blank character on next line |
| - | first non-blank char on previous line |
| zz | center line on screen |
Marks
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| mc | set mark named c |
| 'c | jump to line with mark c |
| `` | move to previous location |
| :marks | list all marks |
Insert mode
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| Ctrl+Y | insert char above the cursor |
| Ctrl+E | insert char below the cursor |
| Ctrl+A | insert text from last insert |
| Ctrl+R= | built-in calculator |
| Ctrl+T | indent |
| Ctrl+D | unindent |
| Ctrl+N | complete a word |
| Ctrl+E | when completion is active, stop it and go back to the originally typed text |
| Ctrl+Y | when completion is active, stop it and accept the currently selected entry |
Command mode
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| Ctrl+R + | Paste from the X clipboard |
Entering & modifying text
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| gi | insert mode at the place of last modification |
| g~w | switch case of word under cursor |
| guw | lowercase the word under cursor |
| gUw | uppercase the word under cursor |
| ^Vunnnn | enter a unicode codepoint, where nnnn is the codepoint value |
Search & Replace
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| fx | move to the next occurence of character x |
| Fx | move to the previous occurence of char x |
| df; | delete text from cursor to the first ; to the right |
| * | find previous occurence of a word under cursor |
| # | find next occurence of a word under cursor |
| :%s/foo/bar/ | replace first foo in each line in entire file with bar |
| :noh | turn off search highlighting |
| :%s/\s+$// | delete trailing whitespace |
| :%s/\n/','/ | join lines with comma |
Text objects
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| :help text-objects | get help on text objects |
| a< | select whole <...> block |
| i' | select text inside single quoted string |
| i" | select text inside double quoted string |
| at | select whole tag |
Repeats
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| start recording commands into register q | |
| q | stop recording |
| @q | execute recording in register q |
| @@ | execute last recording |
| :reg | show registers' contents |
| :'<,'>norm @q | execute a recording on a visual block; you don't actually enter '<'>, VIM does it for you when you press : |
Folding
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| zo | open fold |
| zc | close closest fold |
| zR | open all folds |
| zM | close all folds |
| zj | move to the start of the next fold |
| zk | move to the end of the previous fold |
| :set foldmethod=manual | indent | expr | marker | syntax | diff | set folding method |
Working with windows
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| Ctrl+W _ | maximize current window |
Effective editing
From Bram Moolenaar's talk 7 Habits For Effective Text Editing 2.0.
Tips:
- Use
*and:hlsearchto search for variable names. Reduces typing and eliminates chances of typos - Use
Ctrl+Ncompletion command for long and tricky function names Spellchecker also helps to avoid typos. Abbreviations automatically correct frequently mistyped words.
Command Description :iabbrev teh the automatically correct teh to the, case-insensitive :syntax keyword WordError teh ? Navigation
Command Description :!ctags -R . create tags file for sources in current dir :tag init go to first occurence of tag init:tnext go to next occurence of tag :grep "\ search for occurences of in .h files in the current directory recursively and display the file where the first occurence is found :cnext go to the next occurence :clist list all occurences :copen list all occurences in quickfix window
Misc
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| ZZ | save & exit |
| ZQ | exit without saving |
| ]p | paste before, adjust indent |
| "wyy | copy current line into register w |
| "wp | paste contents of w |
| ga | what is this character under cursor? |
| :set filetype=php | tell Vim to treat the current file as a PHP file (syntax highlighting etc) |
| :set showcmd | show partial commands as you type them |
| :%retab | replace tabstop setting |
| :set list | show unprintable characters such as |
| :r !xxd % | read in a hexdump of the current file |
| gf | go to filename under cursor (make sure path option set correctly) |
