Vim: Basic operation introduction

Overall View:

1. Move the cursor:

1) j  --> move down

2) k --> move up

3) h --> move forward

4) l  --> move afterward

5) 0 --> move to the start of current line

6) $ --> move to the end of current line

7) w --> move to the start of next word

8) e --> move to the end of next word

9) 3w --> move 3 words afterward

10) 3e --> move 3 words afterward

 

2. Deletion

1) x   --> delete single character at the cursor

2)dw --> delete whole word at the cursor including all the spaces after the word.

3)d$ --> delete all characters including and after the current cursor. 

4) d3w --> delete 3 words afterward

5) d3e --> delete 3 words afterward

6) dd -->   delete current line

7) d2d --> delete 2 lines afterward including current line

8) 2dd --> delete 2 lines afterward including current line. same with d2d

9) ce   --> delete  the left character in the word after & including the current cursor

10) c$

 

3. Insertion

1)  i  --> insert before current cursor

2)  I -->  insert before the first character of current line.

3) a --> insert after current cursor

4) A --> insert after the last character of current line.

    w - until the start of the next word, EXCLUDING its first character.
    e - to the end of the current word, INCLUDING the last character.
    $ - to the end of the line, INCLUDING the last character.

5) o --> open a line BELOW the cursor and start Insert mode

6) O --> open a line ABOVE the cursor and start Insert mode

4) Exit

1) :q! --> quit without saving changes

2) :wq --> quit and saving all changes

 

5) Undo

1) u --> undo single operation

2) U --> undo all the operations on a line.

  1. To delete from the cursor up to the next word type:    dw
  2. To delete from the cursor to the end of a line type:    d$
  3. To delete a whole line type:    dd

  4. To repeat a motion prepend it with a number:   2w
  5. The format for a change command is:
               operator   [number]   motion
     where:
       operator - is what to do, such as  d  for delete
       [number] - is an optional count to repeat the motion
       motion   - moves over the text to operate on, such as  w (word),
		  $ (to the end of line), etc.

  6. To move to the start of the line use a zero:  0

  7. To undo previous actions, type: 	       u  (lowercase u)
     To undo all the changes on a line, type:  U  (capital U)
     To undo the undo's, type:		       CTRL-R

 

6) Paste

1) p --> paste after current line

2) P --> paste before current line

 

7) Replace

1) r --> replace single character on the cursor

2) R --> replace more than one character on the cursor.

3) :s/thee/the    --> replace the word 'thee' with 'the' in current line. only replace once.

4) :s/thee/the/g --> replace the word 'thee' with 'the' in current line. replace all occurence in current line.

5) :%s/thee/the/g --> replace the word 'thee' with 'the' replace all occurence in current file.

     type   :#,#s/old/new/g    where #,# are the line numbers of the range
                               of lines where the substitution is to be done.
     Type   :%s/old/new/g      to change every occurrence in the whole file.
     Type   :%s/old/new/gc     to find every occurrence in the whole file,
     			       with a prompt whether to substitute or not.

 

8) Position

1) G --> Go to the last line of the file

2) gg --> Go to the first line of the file

3) ctrl + g --> Also called CTRL-G, show the detail position information for current line.

4) 123G  --> Move cursor to line 123.

5) Ctrl + b --> Move backward one screen

6) Ctrl + f --> Move forward one screen

 

9) Search

1) /errroor<ENTER> --> find the word "errroor" in file search FORWARD for the phrase.

2) ?errroor<ENTER> --> find the word "errroor" in file search BACKWARD for the phrase.

3) n       --> go to next match 

4) N       --> go to prev match

5) %      --> go to the corresponding character. {}, [], ()

                  This is very useful in debugging a program with unmatched parentheses!

6) ctrl+o --> go to older position

7) ctrl+i  --> go to newer position

 

10) Select

1) v    --> start visual selection

 

11) Copy

1) y   --> yank (copy)

2) yw --> copy word

3) ye --> copy word

4) y$ --> copy till the end of line

5) yy --> copy whole line

 

12) Set command

Typing ":set xxx" sets the option "xxx".  Some options are:
  	'ic' 'ignorecase'	ignore upper/lower case when searching
	'is' 'incsearch'	show partial matches for a search phrase
	'hls' 'hlsearch'	highlight all matching phrases
     You can either use the long or the short option name.