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cheatsheet basic

Salam Hiyali edited this page May 3, 2017 · 1 revision

Global

:help keyword - open help for keyword

:o file - open file

:saveas file - save file as

:close - close current pane

K - open man page for word under the cursor

Cursor movement

h - move cursor left

j - move cursor down

k - move cursor up

l - move cursor right

H - move to top of screen

M - move to middle of screen

L - move to bottom of screen

w - jump forwards to the start of a word

W - jump forwards to the start of a word (words can contain punctuation)

e - jump forwards to the end of a word

E - jump forwards to the end of a word (words can contain punctuation)

b - jump backwards to the start of a word

B - jump backwards to the start of a word (words can contain punctuation)

0 - jump to the start of the line

^ - jump to the first non-blank character of the line

$ - jump to the end of the line

g_ - jump to the last non-blank character of the line

gg - go to the first line of the document

G - go to the last line of the document

5G - go to line 5

fx - jump to next occurrence of character x

tx - jump to before next occurrence of character x

} - jump to next paragraph (or function/block, when editing code)

{ - jump to previous paragraph (or function/block, when editing code)

zz - center cursor on screen

Ctrl + b - move back one full screen

Ctrl + f - move forward one full screen

Ctrl + d - move forward 1/2 a screen

Ctrl + u - move back 1/2 a screen

Tip Prefix a cursor movement command with a number to repeat it. For example, 4j moves down 4 lines.

Insert mode - inserting/appending text

i - insert before the cursor

I - insert at the beginning of the line

a - insert (append) after the cursor

A - insert (append) at the end of the line

o - append (open) a new line below the current line

O - append (open) a new line above the current line

ea - insert (append) at the end of the word

Esc - exit insert mode

Editing

r - replace a single character

J - join line below to the current one

cc - change (replace) entire line

cw - change (replace) to the end of the word

c$ - change (replace) to the end of the line

s - delete character and substitute text

S - delete line and substitute text (same as cc)

xp - transpose two letters (delete and paste)

u - undo

Ctrl + r - redo

. - repeat last command

Marking text (visual mode)

v - start visual mode, mark lines, then do a command (like y-yank)

V - start linewise visual mode

o - move to other end of marked area

Ctrl + v - start visual block mode

O - move to other corner of block

aw - mark a word

ab - a block with ()

aB - a block with {}

ib - inner block with ()

iB - inner block with {}

Esc - exit visual mode

Visual commands

> - shift text right

< - shift text left

y - yank (copy) marked text

d - delete marked text

~ - switch case

Registers

:reg - show registers content

"xy - yank into register x

"xp - paste contents of register x

Tip Registers are being stored in ~/.viminfo, and will be loaded again on next restart of vim.

Tip Register 0 contains always the value of the last yank command.

Marks

:marks - list of marks

ma - set current position for mark A

`a - jump to position of mark A

y`a - yank text to position of mark A

Macros

qa - record macro a

q - stop recording macro

@a - run macro a

@@ - rerun last run macro

Cut and paste

yy - yank (copy) a line

2yy - yank (copy) 2 lines

yw - yank (copy) the characters of the word from the cursor position to the start of the next word

y$ - yank (copy) to end of line

p - put (paste) the clipboard after cursor

P - put (paste) before cursor

dd - delete (cut) a line

2dd - delete (cut) 2 lines

dw - delete (cut) the characters of the word from the cursor position to the start of the next word

D - delete (cut) to the end of the line

d$ - delete (cut) to the end of the line

x - delete (cut) character

Exiting

:w - write (save) the file, but don't exit

:w !sudo tee % - write out the current file using sudo

:wq or :x or ZZ - write (save) and quit

:q - quit (fails if there are unsaved changes)

:q! or ZQ - quit and throw away unsaved changes

Search and replace

/pattern - search for pattern

?pattern - search backward for pattern

\vpattern - 'very magic' pattern: non-alphanumeric characters are interpreted as special regex symbols (no escaping needed)

n - repeat search in same direction

N - repeat search in opposite direction

:%s/old/new/g - replace all old with new throughout file

:%s/old/new/gc - replace all old with new throughout file with confirmations

:noh - remove highlighting of search matches

Search in multiple files

:vimgrep /pattern/ {file} - search for pattern in multiple files

e.g. :vimgrep /foo/ */

:cn - jump to the next match

:cp - jump to the previous match

:copen - open a window containing the list of matches

Working with multiple files

:e file - edit a file in a new buffer

:bnext or :bn - go to the next buffer

:bprev or :bp - go to the previous buffer

:bd - delete a buffer (close a file)

:ls - list all open buffers

:sp file - open a file in a new buffer and split window

:vsp file - open a file in a new buffer and vertically split window

Ctrl + ws - split window

Ctrl + ww - switch windows

Ctrl + wq - quit a window

Ctrl + wv - split window vertically

Ctrl + wh - move cursor to the left window (vertical split)

Ctrl + wl - move cursor to the right window (vertical split)

Ctrl + wj - move cursor to the window below (horizontal split)

Ctrl + wk - move cursor to the window above (horizontal split)

Tabs

:tabnew or :tabnew file - open a file in a new tab

Ctrl + wT - move the current split window into its own tab

gt or :tabnext or :tabn - move to the next tab

gT or :tabprev or :tabp - move to the previous tab

#gt - move to tab number #

:tabmove # - move current tab to the #th position (indexed from 0)

:tabclose or :tabc - close the current tab and all its windows

:tabonly or :tabo - close all tabs except for the current one

:tabdo command - run the command on all tabs (e.g. :tabdo q - closes all opened tabs)