Practical Vim: Getting Around Faster

Series notes on Practical Vim by D. Neil:

Practical Vim: Modes

Practical Vim: Files

Practical Vim: Getting Around Faster

Practical Vim: Registers

Contents

Chap 8 - Navigate Inside Files with Motions
Chap 9 - Navigate Between Files with Jumps

Chap 8 - Navigate Inside Files with Motions

Tip 46: Keep Your Fingers on the Home Row

home row: left hand on a s d f; right hand on h j k l.

Command	Move cursor
`h`	one column left
`l`	one column right
`j`	one line down
`k`	one line up

Tip 47: Distinguish Between Real Lines and Display Lines

When the wrap setting is enabled (it’s on by default), each line that exceeds the window width will display as wrapped.

Command	Move cursor
`gj`	down one display line
`gk`	up one display line
`0`	to first character of real line
`g0`	to first character of display line
`^`	to first nonblank character of real line
`g^`	to first nonblank character of display line
`$`	to end of real line
`g$`	to end of display line

Tip 48: Move Word-Wise

Command	Move cursor
`w`	forward to start of next word
`b`	backward to previous ‘start of word’
`e`	forward to next ‘end of word’
`ge`	backward to end of previous word

ea acts like ‘append at the end of the current word’; gea acts like ‘append at the end of the previous word’.

For each of the word-wise motions, there is a WORD-wise equivalent, including W B E gE. A WORD is defined as consisting of a sequence of nonblank characters separated with whitespaces.

Tip 49: Find by Character

Command	Effect
`f{char}`	forward to the next occurrence of `{char}`
`F{char}`	backward to the previous occurrence of `{char}`
`t{char}`	forward to the character before the next occurrence of `{char}`
`T{char}`	backward to the character after the previous occurrence of `{char}`
`;`	repeat the last character-search command
`,`	reverse the last character-search command

Character search can be used like a motion, and hence can be combined with d{motion} c{motion} to finish more complicated operations.

It is better to choose target characters with a low frequency of occurrences, e.g. x z are better than e f.

Tip 50: Search to Navigate

/ to search for characters in the buffer in a forward direction; ? in a backward direction. Note that it jumps to put the cursor right at the beginning of the occurrence.

n to jump to the next occurrence by repeating the previous search; N to jump in the inverse direction.

Search can help in Visual mode to guide text selection.

Search can be combined with d{motion}.

Tip 51: Trace Selection with Precision Text Objects

Text Object	Selection
`a)` or `ab`	a pair of `(parentheses)`
`i)` or `ib`	inside of `(parentheses)`
`a}` or `aB`	a pair of `{braces}`
`i}` or `iB`	inside of `{braces}`
`a]`	a pair of `[brackets]`
`i]`	inside of `[brackets]`
`a>`	a pair of `<angle brackets>`
`i>`	inside of `<angle brackets>`
`a'`	a pair of `'single quotes'`
`i'`	inside of `'single quotes'`
`a"`	a pair of `"double quotes"`
`i"`	inside of `"double quotes"`
a`	a pair of `backticks`
i`	inside of `backticks`
`at`	a pair of `<xml>tags</xml>`
`it`	inside of `<xml>tags</xml>`

Tip 52: Delete Around, or Change Inside

Keystrokes	Buffer Contents
`iw`	current word
`aw`	current word plus one space
`iW`	current WORD
`aW`	current WORD plus one space
`is`	current sentence
`as`	current sentence plus one space
`ip`	current paragraph
`ap`	current paragraph plus one space

Tip 53: Mark Your Place and Snap Back to It

m{a-zA-Z}: marks the current cursor location with the designated letter (see :h m).

`{mark}: jump to a mark.

Automatic Marks:

Keystrokes	Buffer Contents
``	position before the last jump within current file
`.	location of last change
`^	location of last insertion
`[	start of last change or yank
`]	end of last change or yank
`<	start of last visual selection
`>	end of last visual selection

Tip 54: Jump Between Matching Parentheses

% lets us jump between opening and closing sets of parentheses (see :h %). It works with (), {}, and [].

Vim ships with a plugin matchit, which enhances the % command. When matchit is enabled, % can jump between matching pairs of keywords, like tags in HTML, class/end def/end if/end in Ruby. To enable matchit on startup:

set nocompatible
filetype plugin on
runtime macros/matchit.vim

Another good plugin is Surround.vim. Visually select some characters, and S" would surround the selection with a pair of ". S) S} work similarly. Changing existing delimiters is also possible: cs}] would change {London} to [London]. Surround.vim should be mannually installed.

Chap 9 - Navigate Between Files with Jumps

Tip 55: Traverse the Jump List

:jump: show the jump list

<C-o>: jump back

<C-i>: jump forward

Command	Effect
`[count]G`	jump to line number
//pattern`<CR>`/?pattern`<CR>`/`n`/`N`	jump to next/previous occurrence of pattern
`%`	jump to matching parentheses
`(`/`)`	jump to start of previous/next sentence
`{`/`}`	jump to start of previous/next paragraph
`H`/`M`/`L`	jump to top/middle/bottom of screen
`gf`	jump to file name under the cursor
`<C-]>`	jump to definition of keyword under the cursor
`'{mark}`/`{mark}	jump to a mark

Tip 56: Traverse the Change List

:changes: show the change list

g;: traverse backward in the change list

g,: traverse forward in the change list

`.: mark to the position of the last change

`^: mark to the position of the cursor the last time Insert mode was stopped

gi: use `^ to restore the cursor position, and then switch to Insert mode

Tip 57: Jump to the Filename Under the Cursor

gf: jump to the filename under the cursor

:set suffixesadd+=.rb: tell Vim to find filenames with .rb extension. Note that common file-type extensions are automatically handled in most modern Vim distributions.

:set path?: inspect the value of path

Tip 58: Snap Between Files Using Global Marks

m{letter}: create a mark at the current cursor position. Lowercase letters work locally in a buffer; Uppercases are global.

:vimgrep /{pattern}/ {files} can search and jump in files. Set a global mark before diving with :vimgrep.