10 ms·

Vimperator: a Vim-like Firefox

139 points by CapacitorSet 10y ago

baotiao 10y ago
I have used vimperator for about 6 years, this is only reason that I still use firefox. It's really amazing.
- cszerzo 10y ago
  Although i'm not sure exactly how their features compare, I use vimium on chrome which seems to be more or less the same: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/vimium/dbepggeogbaibhgnhhndojpepiihcmeb?hl=en https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/vimium/dbepggeogba...
  - baotiao 10y ago
    I have trid vimium on chrome, vimperator is more configurable, you can change the theme, the suggest, hide the navigation bar...
  - wingerlang 10y ago
    The key difference for me was the way they create the names of the links in the popup. In Chrome you need to enter more or less random letters, while in vimperator you can write the link name. The difference in usability was HUGE for me and made me switch to FF for a brief moment from using Chrome since its release day.
- dblohm7 10y ago
  Out of curiosity, why would you switch if it weren't for vimperator?
  - exDM69 10y ago
    Not GP but same situation. Firefox isn't always great. Start-up time is really slow, hogs a lot of memory, unnecessarily slow and sluggish and most sites are primarily engineered for WebKit/Blink -based browser engines these days.
    - krzyk 10y ago
      Lot's of memory? Firefox nowadays uses less then Chrome (Chrome one process per tab is a killer for free RAM). As for websites engineered for WebKit/Blink I haven't seen that yet, but I was afraid it might happen eventually - new IE6 (or was it IE5?) will happen again :(.
      - govg 10y ago
        I've never had an issue with memory (have RAM to spare) even though I use tab-groups extensively and frequently have 600+ tabs stored that way. But I do have issues with slow startup times. Is it linked to tab groups? I didn't see any significant speedup upon switching to an SSD, so I'm assuming it is inherent in the program and not anything specific to reading profiles from disk.
jzelinskie 10y ago
Who develops vimperator these days? Some of their primary maintainers moved onto a separate project called Pentadactyl[0] a few years ago. [0]: http://5digits.org/pentadactyl/ http://5digits.org/pentadactyl/
- pmoriarty 10y ago
  Pentadactyl isn't the successor to Vimperator, it's just a similar extension with a different feature set and some former Vimperator developers working on it. From what I understand, Vimperator continued to be developed after Pentadactyl was born. Long ago I compared the two and decided to use Pentadactyl because it seemed to be more powerful, but I'm not sure how they compare these days. A much bigger problem is that Firefox is moving (has moved?) away from XUL and XPCOM, a move which permanently breaks extensions like Pentadactyl (and Vimperator too). Already Pentadactyl is broken for me on the latest versions of Firefox and Pale Moon (though I can't say for sure that it's because of XPCOM and XUL or for some other reason). In addition, the Pentadactyl nightly builds aren't signed, so if I want Firefox to allow them to be installed I have to run the Firefox Developer build and make a global preference change to allow all unsigned extensions to be installed. This breaking of my favorite extensions on Firefox has made me move to Pale Moon, where Pentadactyl was working until recently. Now that Pentadcatyl doesn't even work on Pale Moon anymore, I'm not sure what to do.
  - Ar-Curunir 10y ago
    VimFx is not as powerful as the other two, but it is a stable replacement IMO.
  - oib 10y ago
    Signed builds are available here: https://github.com/willsALMANJ/pentadactyl-signed/releases https://github.com/willsALMANJ/pentadactyl-signed/releases It works for me on Firefox 50.1.0 But the move away from XUL is indeed worrisome for plugins like these... I kinda hope someone will just build it into the servo project and make that into a usable minimal browser.
    - 10y ago
twistedanimator 10y ago
I used to be a user of pentadactyl, but never liked how it changed the entire look of the browser. Just last a couple of days ago, I found VimFx which is exactly what I always wanted. It's also open source at https://github.com/akhodakivskiy/VimFx https://github.com/akhodakivskiy/VimFx
- forgotmypw 10y ago
  Seconding VimFX. Works pretty much out of the box without having to relearn how to use the browser.
- sirn 10y ago
  I'm the other way around: I tried switching from Vimperator to VimFx for a week, but couldn't really make myself compatible with it. I'm too used to browsing with toolbars=none[1] and browse almost exclusively via Vimperator command line. I found VimFx still not enough to be used with everything hidden. Too bad that Vimperator will most likely stop working once Mozilla deprecate XUL addons in Firefox 57[2]. [1]: https://files.grid.in.th/0EEhIG.png https://files.grid.in.th/0EEhIG.png [2]: https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2016/11/23/add-ons-in-2017/ https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2016/11/23/add-ons-in-2017/
  - chousuke 10y ago
    I switched to VimFx so I could get electrolysis working. I had to tweak scrolling speed quite drastically and and there are some behavioural differences which means I have to unlearn some muscle memory. However, with the classic theme restorer addon the UI is compressed enough that it doesn't bother me much and I can use the keyboard for almost everything. I still wish I could have the command line back though. Annoyingly Firefox actually includes some sort of command line thing when I press :, but it seems to be only for web developers. I'd be happy if Mozilla provided a way to extend that so that it could be used for actual browsing...
    - wsha 10y ago
      I switched to VimFx recently for the same reason. Actually, the ":" shortcut for the GCLI command line is a VimFx shortcut, not a standard Firefox one. The GCLI can be customized. See for example: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Tools/GCLI/Writing_GCLI_Commands https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Tools/GCLI/Writing_... I added a command to toggle a preference in about:config that I switch often. It is kind of a pain to write and debug commands for the GCLI though (compared to writing javascript mapping in Pentadactyl).
wodenokoto 10y ago
The idea sounds intriguing, but I fail to see how `:back` is easier or faster than `cmd+LeftArrow` or how `:open url.com` is faster than `cmd+l url.com` or `cmd+t url.com` What is the killer feature here?
- vortico 10y ago
  Usually you map single characters to commands like that in your .vimperatorrc
  - sleepychu 10y ago
    Is that a joke or can you actually do that?
    - truncate 10y ago
      You can. I used to be a Vimperator user few years ago. Left because I felt it made browser a bit slow.
    - keevie 10y ago
      yes, you can definitely do that. I'm using the chrome version (vimium) but have back mapped to capital h (for history)
    - vortico 10y ago
      Not a joke. Here's something I posted in a recent thread to disable/enable CSS in web pages with the s / shift-S key (perhaps because CSS makes a particular website worse). nmap s :emenu View.Page Style.No Style<CR> nmap <S-s> :emenu View.Page Style.Basic Page Style<CR> You could assign the 'b' character to the :back command, or use the default shift-H. If you want to go back 4 pages, you can simply type "4 o", just like in vim.
- AaronLasseigne 10y ago
  Using j and k to scroll is really nice. One of my favorite things is that you can use marks. I'll mark where I am while reading, scroll back to check something, and then jump back to my mark. It's very handy.
Dangeranger 10y ago
Chrome has Vimium for this, it's good to know there is an analogue for Firefox. I love using Vim bindings while browsing. https://github.com/philc/vimium https://github.com/philc/vimium
- mbel 10y ago
  Without Vimpertors's toolbar it's really hard to call Vimium an analogue. In comparison to options that Vimperator offers Vimium is just a couple of keymappings.
  - sirn 10y ago
    Closer to Vimperator is probably cVim[1], which also provides command line mode. [1]: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/cvim/ihlenndgcmojhcghmfjfneahoeklbjjh https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/cvim/ihlenndgcmojh...
    - gnodar 10y ago
      I've used both, and cVim is superior to Vimium in every respect except for one: the scrolling. In cVim when I hold down 'j' to scroll down, it does an initial jerk, and then scrolls down. Doing the same in Vimium, it has a smoother scroll and doesn't have the annoying initial jerk. That one thing has kept me from switching from Vimium to cVim.
- exDM69 10y ago
  Vimium just doesn't work as well as Vimperator, which is why I use Firefox and not Chromium for my primary browser. That said, Vimperator is far from perfect and sometimes buggy and I don't need all the features (like macros).
- mos_basik 10y ago
  I've become so reliant on Vimium that more than once, when I'm working with someone to do something in their Chrome, I've asked "Can I install this extension really quick? It's driving me nuts having to do things with a mouse." So far people have been nice about it. :) I've known about Vimperator and Pentadactyl since the research I did that led to me starting to use Vimium, but since FF isn't my primary browser I've never tried either. Very interesting to see my sister commenters saying that Vimium doesn't even come close to their functionality. I might have to check Vimperator out. One nitpick about Vimium - I don't like that "f" is included in the default possible characters for link hints, given that "f" is the shortcut to display hints. I always have to go to the settings and take it out, so I know that I can always hit "f" again (instead of Esc) to remove the hints without fear of accidentally leaving the page if I decide I don't want navigate away yet. But at least the option is there! For which I am thankful.
mbel 10y ago
There is also a sibling project called Muttator, which brings vimperator to Thunderbird. It allows you to get mutt-like ergonomics (including vim as text editor) with support for HTML mails.
ams6110 10y ago
Anyone know of something similar with emacs-style key bindings?
- AtticHacker 10y ago
  Firemacs maybe? https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/firemacs/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/firemacs/
- aban 10y ago
  With Vimperator you can remap the keys as you wish [0]; e.g. noremap <C-p> 2k noremap <C-n> 2j To do the same in VimFx, see [1]. Also, Conkeror [2] to Emacs is as qutebrowser is to Vim. [0]: https://gist.github.com/avendael/7028513 https://gist.github.com/avendael/7028513 [1]: https://www.reddit.com/r/emacs/comments/561b03/emacs_keybindings_for_multiprocess_firefox/ https://www.reddit.com/r/emacs/comments/561b03/emacs_keybind... [2]: http://conkeror.org/ http://conkeror.org/
- carldotac 10y ago
  I have found KeySnail[0] to fit my needs, which basically amount to scrolling, copy/paste, and keyboard hints for links. [0]: https://github.com/mooz/keysnail https://github.com/mooz/keysnail
jonaf 10y ago
This is interesting. I never thought of using vim commands to power the browser, but I do love text interfaces. (I type 150 wpm's and find keyboard navigation markedly faster than the point-and-click interface -- especially since keyboards are so much more precise.) In 2008, back when I used Firefox, Mozilla tried an experimental interface called Ubiquity[0]. It was awesome! I don't know if the plugin still works, but I think text interfaces are really the way of the future for power users (everything old is new again)? Has anyone found anything quite like Ubiquity for Chrome or something like Vivaldi? Other examples that come to mind: ChatOps[1] (seemingly popularized lately by Slack), Alfred[2], and even OS X's own Spotlight[3]. Nowadays, though, I just rely on the default keybindings of Chrome for most things. One of my favorites is Cmd+L, which highlights the contents of the address bar. [0]: https://wiki.mozilla.org/Labs/Ubiquity https://wiki.mozilla.org/Labs/Ubiquity [1]: http://blogs.atlassian.com/2016/01/what-is-chatops-adoption-guide/ http://blogs.atlassian.com/2016/01/what-is-chatops-adoption-... [2]: https://www.alfredapp.com/ https://www.alfredapp.com/ [3]: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204014 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204014
- rovr138 10y ago
  I have Vimium in Chrome, VimFX on Firefox and Vimmy in Safari. Maybe something like Vimium would work for you?
green7ea 10y ago
I've been using qutebrowser lately and I'm really liking it. It takes the whole vim thing even further than simple extensions.
y_u_no_rust 10y ago
If only it worked with multiprocess
autocorr 10y ago
I remember using the original keyboard productivity extension for Firefox, "hit-a-hint"[1] back in Firefox 1 & 2. Since discovering vimperator after, it has been an essential extension on par with an ad blocker. However, I found it consistently broke on new releases of Firefox and could take months to fix. Pentadactyl wasn't any better in this regard. For example, the current extension page says it only works up to Firefox 38! I eventually switched to the less powerful extension VimFX[2] that can run on newer versions of Firefox. It has more than 90% of what you use in vimperator: movement, hints, and tab management. And really, things like the vimperator extension bar were made for a time before the awesome bar, which can now do things like completions, searching with keywords, and switching focus to other bookmarks or tabs. It will be sad to see it go when Firefox finally deprecates XUL based extensions, it's like a piece of history! [1] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/hit-a-hint/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/hit-a-hint/ [2] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/vimfx/?src=search https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/vimfx/?src=se...
- SilasX 10y ago
  Yes! I love being able to click on links from the keyboard! Sadly, a lot of new interfaces make it hard for programs to recognize clickable links. I went through a phase where I became obsessed with doing everything from the keyboard rather than mouse[1] and that led me to pentadactyl (and then to vim[2]), an add-on I fell in love with. When the FF upgrades made it stop working I read the docs for how to compile pentadactyl, and I fixed version compatibility. That became an ongoing thing. (One time I also had to fix a bug in the build script.) Sadly, about six months ago, Firefox banned unsigned addons, so I couldn't use pentadactyl even if I allowed them in the config, leading me to write this Hitler parody (and move to vimperator/vimfx): https://youtube.com/watch?v=taGARf8K5J8 https://youtube.com/watch?v=taGARf8K5J8 [1] even registered tyrannyofthemouse.com [2] I would have have heard about vim sooner but for not having much contact with programmers
  - hackuser 10y ago
    > about six months ago, Firefox banned unsigned addons If you use other Firefox editions besides the standard one then you still can use unsigned addons, based on what I've read. [0] The other editions include ESR, nightlies, Developer, and Unbranded. Of course, these editions are not intended for most end-users. [0] https://wiki.mozilla.org/Addons/Extension_Signing https://wiki.mozilla.org/Addons/Extension_Signing
li4ick 10y ago
The one and only reason that stops me from using Vimperator is the smooth scrolling feature, which is built into Vimium. Does anybody know how to get the same behaviour into Vimperator?
chimeracoder 10y ago
I love Vimperator - unfortunately, it's incompatible with e10s (multiprocess Firefox) and it is also completely dependent on the deprecated XUL. Replacing that would essentially be a ground-up rewrite[0]. It looks like Vimperator is likely not going to be updated to work with newer versions of Firefox, which is a real shame, because it works far better than any alternative I've found for either Firefox or Chrome. I even made my own with the new Firefox API to see if I could replicate the experience, but it's tough[1]. The WebExtension interface doesn't give the same level of control that XUL did, and without which it's hard to give the same feel of Vimperator. [0] https://github.com/vimperator/vimperator-labs/issues/211 https://github.com/vimperator/vimperator-labs/issues/211 [1] https://github.com/ChimeraCoder/electrovim https://github.com/ChimeraCoder/electrovim
- richardboegli 10y ago
  Try Pale Moon.
- wsha 10y ago
  I have followed the situation fairly closely, and I agree with your assessment. I haven't seen anything that makes me think either Pentadactyl or Vimperator will survive the deprecation of XUL. The most promising vim-like addon is VimFx (followed by the Chrome addons like Vimium and cVim which maybe will work in Firefox one day as WebExtensions -- I try on Nightly every couple months but they don't work so far). The reason I say this is that it has active development and developers committed to the WebExtensions transition (plus has less features so it is easier to port). You can follow the progress here: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1215061 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1215061 https://github.com/lydell/webextension-keyboard https://github.com/lydell/webextension-keyboard
Morantron 10y ago
Also, if you want a similar behavior for copy pasting in terminal, check this tmux plugin: https://github.com/morantron/tmux-fingers https://github.com/morantron/tmux-fingers </shameless-plug>
protomikron 10y ago
Is it possible (in VimFX) to remap the (Shift) Escape? E.g. in my ~/.vimrc I use imap jj <ESC> How users can live with Vim's default behavior (Escape, Ctrl-C, Ctrl-[) is mysterious to me (I do not like hitting Ctrl). :)
- wsha 10y ago
  You can't categorically remap some key sequence to Escape in VimFx (not sure if you meant Vimperator where you can do this just like in vim). However, you can open the preference and add whatever alternative you want to all of the commands that are mapped to Escape by default.
- citisincyber 10y ago
  system bind caps -> ctrl. reduce stress on the pinky
  - protomikron 10y ago
    I may give that a try again, however 'jj' was more natural for me.
Mauricio_ 10y ago
There's also Vimium for Chrome. Not sure how similar they are, but the only feature that matters about Vimium is pressing the F key, which allows you to open links without using the mouse. It's the greatest idea I've seen and it should be a native feature of major browsers.
- rvern 10y ago
  It is, people just don't know about it (it seems?). In Firefox, just press '/'. You can also toggle 'Search for text when I start typing' in about:preferences#advanced.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - michaelmrose 10y ago
    Totally not even remotely the same thing. You need to type several times as many characters in the best case and it will select the first instance of a string even if it's nowhere near your cursor. Additionaly you can't search for links that are graphics
    - rvern 10y ago
      Actually, it doesn't select the first instance in the document but rather the first after your cursor. And you can use ' instead of / to select only links. It allows you to open links without using the mouse, so saying it is not exactly the same thing would be more accurate than saying it is "not even remotely the same thing."
      - michaelmrose 10y ago
        It is sufficiently poor as not to be worth using as it would only work part of the time and would be more effort than using the mouse.
spicytunacone 10y ago
Been contently using Vimperator for at least a good year now (coming from VimFX), but I'm trying to find something to jump ship to once support drops. It's going to suck losing Rikaisama and uMatrix/uBO. Between the idiomatic :o/:tabopen <se-keyword> searching, marks, recording and buffer management, a simple Vi-like navigation extension can't compare. The fact that there's a .vimperatorrc might be overkill for some, but, like any dotfile, a boon for others. If Vimperator had splits I'd probably stay on some compatible fork.
akurilin 10y ago
Any of you figured out how to get vimperator / pentadactyl to work with all of the SPAs that have their own shortcuts? e.g. Asana or Reviewable or Gmail etc? I've always had a pretty bad time with combining those. Also, is there a solid Chrome version of any of the above?
- CaptSpify 10y ago
  This is a big issue for me. Every stinking website thinks it's a good idea to use crappy inconsistent keyboard shortcuts, but don't have a way to turn them off.
- wsha 10y ago
  I'm not sure what SPAs are or what Asana or Reviewable are, but I have happily used gmail with Pentadactyl by using passkeys. This is what I have in my passkeys setting for gmail: '^https?://(mail|groups)\.google\.com':raNxujkopnczIU/#vl?<UP><DOWN>,gi,gt,gd,gl,
dvcrn 10y ago
I wanted to try Vimperator multiple multiple times but every single time I installed it, it didn't work for some reason. Either Firefox introduced some breaking change that made Vimperator unusable or I received error messages that through a session of Googling I couldn't fix.
rvern 10y ago
If you just want to use your web browser more efficiently, from the keyboard, you don't need addons like Vimperator or VimFX. Firefox already has keyboard shortcuts for everything. You can press Alt+H K to see the list of keyboard shortcuts. You can press Ctrl+L to select the location bar, Ctrl+K to select the search bar. You can set browser.search.openintab if you want searches from the search bar to open in a new tab and keyword.enabled to false if you don't want the location bar to be used for searches. You can press / and type text to select any text with the Quick Find bar,[1] or press ' to select only links. You can use Ctrl+G or F3 in the Quick Find bar to go to the next occurrence of your search and Shift+Ctrl+G or Shift+F3 to go to the previous occurrence. You can use smart bookmarks to go quickly to any website or make searches on any website by putting %s in a bookmark URL and adding a keyword which can be used from the address bar.[2] You can even add keywords that will do POST requests with the 'Add a Keyword for this Search...' context menu item for search fields.[3] There are also many keyboard shortcuts for editing and selecting text in text fields, which have the benefit of being the same in most applications on all platforms. There's a list on Wikipedia.[4] There are keyboard shortcuts even for the more obscure features, like Ctrl+Alt+R to enable reader mode and Ctrl+M to mute or unmute the current tab. Your web browser already has good keyboard shortcuts, you just need to learn them. [1]: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/search-contents-current-page-text-or-links#w_quick-find https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/search-contents-current... [2]: http://kb.mozillazine.org/Bookmark_Keywords http://kb.mozillazine.org/Bookmark_Keywords [3]: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-search-from-address-bar https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-search-from-address... [4]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_of_keyboard_shortcuts#Text_editing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_of_keyboard_shortcuts#Te...
- travv0 10y ago
  Serious question: Is there a way to scroll without using the arrow keys, scroll by pages without PgUp/PgDn, etc? I didn't see anything in the links you provided, and those buttons aren't very convenient on most keyboards I've used.
  - rvern 10y ago
    Yep. You can use Space to scroll a page down and Shift+Space to scroll a page up. For more precise scrolling, though, you will have to use the arrow keys or the mouse.
sudarshan_sar 10y ago
This is a great plugin and I love being able to open URLs and search google, amazon etc without actually visiting the landing page first - like hitting 'o-g <search>' or 'o-a <search>' for example. However with the support for multiprocess not being there, I decided to move on to vimfx which is somewhat more minimalistic and less easily configurable compared to vimperator, but in my experience so far it is really smooth even though it lacks that particular feature(among others) that I highlighted earlier in the comment(well not entirely, you can still google search in a similar way). Overall though vimperator was/is a great plugin, especially for people who are really used to vim and hate switching to mouse for browsing the web.
- autocorr 10y ago
  That's something I ran into as well, but actually has had a solution in vanilla Firefox for a while. You can create keywords for searches by right clicking a search box and selecting "add keyword for this search", and can then be used in just the same as vimperator by typing that keyword into the navigation/awesome bar (such as with VimFX). One advantage to this is that you can create a bookmark folder of search keywords, and they'll sync across all your devices thru Firefox sync. I find this especially handy on Firefox mobile.
  - wsha 10y ago
    This is a nice feature. The downsides compared to Vimperator/Pentadactyl is that you can tab-complete the search term and you can't get search suggestions as you type (or at least I haven't gotten either of these things to work).
anhari 10y ago
I just discovered Vimperator a few weeks ago, and I am really enjoying it thus far. I love the fact that it can be customized with a dot file, and I have implemented some really useful leader keys that I have come to really rely on. So far I've set up some resizing the window and accessing various dev tools: http://anhari.io/2017/01/10/vimming-around-in-firefox.html http://anhari.io/2017/01/10/vimming-around-in-firefox.html

139 points by CapacitorSet 10y ago

baotiao 10y ago

I have used vimperator for about 6 years, this is only reason that I still use firefox. It's really amazing.

cszerzo 10y ago
Although i'm not sure exactly how their features compare, I use vimium on chrome which seems to be more or less the same: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/vimium/dbepggeogbaibhgnhhndojpepiihcmeb?hl=en https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/vimium/dbepggeogba...
- baotiao 10y ago
  I have trid vimium on chrome, vimperator is more configurable, you can change the theme, the suggest, hide the navigation bar...
- wingerlang 10y ago
  The key difference for me was the way they create the names of the links in the popup. In Chrome you need to enter more or less random letters, while in vimperator you can write the link name. The difference in usability was HUGE for me and made me switch to FF for a brief moment from using Chrome since its release day.
dblohm7 10y ago
Out of curiosity, why would you switch if it weren't for vimperator?
- exDM69 10y ago
  Not GP but same situation. Firefox isn't always great. Start-up time is really slow, hogs a lot of memory, unnecessarily slow and sluggish and most sites are primarily engineered for WebKit/Blink -based browser engines these days.
  - krzyk 10y ago
    Lot's of memory? Firefox nowadays uses less then Chrome (Chrome one process per tab is a killer for free RAM). As for websites engineered for WebKit/Blink I haven't seen that yet, but I was afraid it might happen eventually - new IE6 (or was it IE5?) will happen again :(.
    - govg 10y ago
      I've never had an issue with memory (have RAM to spare) even though I use tab-groups extensively and frequently have 600+ tabs stored that way. But I do have issues with slow startup times. Is it linked to tab groups? I didn't see any significant speedup upon switching to an SSD, so I'm assuming it is inherent in the program and not anything specific to reading profiles from disk.

jzelinskie 10y ago

Who develops vimperator these days? Some of their primary maintainers moved onto a separate project called Pentadactyl[0] a few years ago. [0]: http://5digits.org/pentadactyl/ http://5digits.org/pentadactyl/

pmoriarty 10y ago
Pentadactyl isn't the successor to Vimperator, it's just a similar extension with a different feature set and some former Vimperator developers working on it. From what I understand, Vimperator continued to be developed after Pentadactyl was born. Long ago I compared the two and decided to use Pentadactyl because it seemed to be more powerful, but I'm not sure how they compare these days. A much bigger problem is that Firefox is moving (has moved?) away from XUL and XPCOM, a move which permanently breaks extensions like Pentadactyl (and Vimperator too). Already Pentadactyl is broken for me on the latest versions of Firefox and Pale Moon (though I can't say for sure that it's because of XPCOM and XUL or for some other reason). In addition, the Pentadactyl nightly builds aren't signed, so if I want Firefox to allow them to be installed I have to run the Firefox Developer build and make a global preference change to allow all unsigned extensions to be installed. This breaking of my favorite extensions on Firefox has made me move to Pale Moon, where Pentadactyl was working until recently. Now that Pentadcatyl doesn't even work on Pale Moon anymore, I'm not sure what to do.
- Ar-Curunir 10y ago
  VimFx is not as powerful as the other two, but it is a stable replacement IMO.
- oib 10y ago
  Signed builds are available here: https://github.com/willsALMANJ/pentadactyl-signed/releases https://github.com/willsALMANJ/pentadactyl-signed/releases It works for me on Firefox 50.1.0 But the move away from XUL is indeed worrisome for plugins like these... I kinda hope someone will just build it into the servo project and make that into a usable minimal browser.
  - 10y ago

twistedanimator 10y ago

I used to be a user of pentadactyl, but never liked how it changed the entire look of the browser. Just last a couple of days ago, I found VimFx which is exactly what I always wanted. It's also open source at https://github.com/akhodakivskiy/VimFx https://github.com/akhodakivskiy/VimFx

forgotmypw 10y ago
Seconding VimFX. Works pretty much out of the box without having to relearn how to use the browser.
sirn 10y ago
I'm the other way around: I tried switching from Vimperator to VimFx for a week, but couldn't really make myself compatible with it. I'm too used to browsing with toolbars=none[1] and browse almost exclusively via Vimperator command line. I found VimFx still not enough to be used with everything hidden. Too bad that Vimperator will most likely stop working once Mozilla deprecate XUL addons in Firefox 57[2]. [1]: https://files.grid.in.th/0EEhIG.png https://files.grid.in.th/0EEhIG.png [2]: https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2016/11/23/add-ons-in-2017/ https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2016/11/23/add-ons-in-2017/
- chousuke 10y ago
  I switched to VimFx so I could get electrolysis working. I had to tweak scrolling speed quite drastically and and there are some behavioural differences which means I have to unlearn some muscle memory. However, with the classic theme restorer addon the UI is compressed enough that it doesn't bother me much and I can use the keyboard for almost everything. I still wish I could have the command line back though. Annoyingly Firefox actually includes some sort of command line thing when I press :, but it seems to be only for web developers. I'd be happy if Mozilla provided a way to extend that so that it could be used for actual browsing...
  - wsha 10y ago
    I switched to VimFx recently for the same reason. Actually, the ":" shortcut for the GCLI command line is a VimFx shortcut, not a standard Firefox one. The GCLI can be customized. See for example: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Tools/GCLI/Writing_GCLI_Commands https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Tools/GCLI/Writing_... I added a command to toggle a preference in about:config that I switch often. It is kind of a pain to write and debug commands for the GCLI though (compared to writing javascript mapping in Pentadactyl).

wodenokoto 10y ago

The idea sounds intriguing, but I fail to see how `:back` is easier or faster than `cmd+LeftArrow` or how `:open url.com` is faster than `cmd+l url.com` or `cmd+t url.com` What is the killer feature here?

vortico 10y ago
Usually you map single characters to commands like that in your .vimperatorrc
- sleepychu 10y ago
  Is that a joke or can you actually do that?
  - truncate 10y ago
    You can. I used to be a Vimperator user few years ago. Left because I felt it made browser a bit slow.
  - keevie 10y ago
    yes, you can definitely do that. I'm using the chrome version (vimium) but have back mapped to capital h (for history)
  - vortico 10y ago
    Not a joke. Here's something I posted in a recent thread to disable/enable CSS in web pages with the s / shift-S key (perhaps because CSS makes a particular website worse). nmap s :emenu View.Page Style.No Style<CR> nmap <S-s> :emenu View.Page Style.Basic Page Style<CR> You could assign the 'b' character to the :back command, or use the default shift-H. If you want to go back 4 pages, you can simply type "4 o", just like in vim.
AaronLasseigne 10y ago
Using j and k to scroll is really nice. One of my favorite things is that you can use marks. I'll mark where I am while reading, scroll back to check something, and then jump back to my mark. It's very handy.

Dangeranger 10y ago

Chrome has Vimium for this, it's good to know there is an analogue for Firefox. I love using Vim bindings while browsing. https://github.com/philc/vimium https://github.com/philc/vimium

mbel 10y ago
Without Vimpertors's toolbar it's really hard to call Vimium an analogue. In comparison to options that Vimperator offers Vimium is just a couple of keymappings.
- sirn 10y ago
  Closer to Vimperator is probably cVim[1], which also provides command line mode. [1]: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/cvim/ihlenndgcmojhcghmfjfneahoeklbjjh https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/cvim/ihlenndgcmojh...
  - gnodar 10y ago
    I've used both, and cVim is superior to Vimium in every respect except for one: the scrolling. In cVim when I hold down 'j' to scroll down, it does an initial jerk, and then scrolls down. Doing the same in Vimium, it has a smoother scroll and doesn't have the annoying initial jerk. That one thing has kept me from switching from Vimium to cVim.
exDM69 10y ago
Vimium just doesn't work as well as Vimperator, which is why I use Firefox and not Chromium for my primary browser. That said, Vimperator is far from perfect and sometimes buggy and I don't need all the features (like macros).
mos_basik 10y ago
I've become so reliant on Vimium that more than once, when I'm working with someone to do something in their Chrome, I've asked "Can I install this extension really quick? It's driving me nuts having to do things with a mouse." So far people have been nice about it. :) I've known about Vimperator and Pentadactyl since the research I did that led to me starting to use Vimium, but since FF isn't my primary browser I've never tried either. Very interesting to see my sister commenters saying that Vimium doesn't even come close to their functionality. I might have to check Vimperator out. One nitpick about Vimium - I don't like that "f" is included in the default possible characters for link hints, given that "f" is the shortcut to display hints. I always have to go to the settings and take it out, so I know that I can always hit "f" again (instead of Esc) to remove the hints without fear of accidentally leaving the page if I decide I don't want navigate away yet. But at least the option is there! For which I am thankful.

mbel 10y ago

There is also a sibling project called Muttator, which brings vimperator to Thunderbird. It allows you to get mutt-like ergonomics (including vim as text editor) with support for HTML mails.

ams6110 10y ago

Anyone know of something similar with emacs-style key bindings?

AtticHacker 10y ago
Firemacs maybe? https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/firemacs/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/firemacs/
aban 10y ago
With Vimperator you can remap the keys as you wish [0]; e.g. noremap <C-p> 2k noremap <C-n> 2j To do the same in VimFx, see [1]. Also, Conkeror [2] to Emacs is as qutebrowser is to Vim. [0]: https://gist.github.com/avendael/7028513 https://gist.github.com/avendael/7028513 [1]: https://www.reddit.com/r/emacs/comments/561b03/emacs_keybindings_for_multiprocess_firefox/ https://www.reddit.com/r/emacs/comments/561b03/emacs_keybind... [2]: http://conkeror.org/ http://conkeror.org/
carldotac 10y ago
I have found KeySnail[0] to fit my needs, which basically amount to scrolling, copy/paste, and keyboard hints for links. [0]: https://github.com/mooz/keysnail https://github.com/mooz/keysnail

jonaf 10y ago

This is interesting. I never thought of using vim commands to power the browser, but I do love text interfaces. (I type 150 wpm's and find keyboard navigation markedly faster than the point-and-click interface -- especially since keyboards are so much more precise.) In 2008, back when I used Firefox, Mozilla tried an experimental interface called Ubiquity[0]. It was awesome! I don't know if the plugin still works, but I think text interfaces are really the way of the future for power users (everything old is new again)? Has anyone found anything quite like Ubiquity for Chrome or something like Vivaldi? Other examples that come to mind: ChatOps[1] (seemingly popularized lately by Slack), Alfred[2], and even OS X's own Spotlight[3]. Nowadays, though, I just rely on the default keybindings of Chrome for most things. One of my favorites is Cmd+L, which highlights the contents of the address bar. [0]: https://wiki.mozilla.org/Labs/Ubiquity https://wiki.mozilla.org/Labs/Ubiquity [1]: http://blogs.atlassian.com/2016/01/what-is-chatops-adoption-guide/ http://blogs.atlassian.com/2016/01/what-is-chatops-adoption-... [2]: https://www.alfredapp.com/ https://www.alfredapp.com/ [3]: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204014 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204014

rovr138 10y ago
I have Vimium in Chrome, VimFX on Firefox and Vimmy in Safari. Maybe something like Vimium would work for you?

green7ea 10y ago

I've been using qutebrowser lately and I'm really liking it. It takes the whole vim thing even further than simple extensions.

y_u_no_rust 10y ago

If only it worked with multiprocess

autocorr 10y ago

I remember using the original keyboard productivity extension for Firefox, "hit-a-hint"[1] back in Firefox 1 & 2. Since discovering vimperator after, it has been an essential extension on par with an ad blocker. However, I found it consistently broke on new releases of Firefox and could take months to fix. Pentadactyl wasn't any better in this regard. For example, the current extension page says it only works up to Firefox 38! I eventually switched to the less powerful extension VimFX[2] that can run on newer versions of Firefox. It has more than 90% of what you use in vimperator: movement, hints, and tab management. And really, things like the vimperator extension bar were made for a time before the awesome bar, which can now do things like completions, searching with keywords, and switching focus to other bookmarks or tabs. It will be sad to see it go when Firefox finally deprecates XUL based extensions, it's like a piece of history! [1] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/hit-a-hint/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/hit-a-hint/ [2] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/vimfx/?src=search https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/vimfx/?src=se...

SilasX 10y ago
Yes! I love being able to click on links from the keyboard! Sadly, a lot of new interfaces make it hard for programs to recognize clickable links. I went through a phase where I became obsessed with doing everything from the keyboard rather than mouse[1] and that led me to pentadactyl (and then to vim[2]), an add-on I fell in love with. When the FF upgrades made it stop working I read the docs for how to compile pentadactyl, and I fixed version compatibility. That became an ongoing thing. (One time I also had to fix a bug in the build script.) Sadly, about six months ago, Firefox banned unsigned addons, so I couldn't use pentadactyl even if I allowed them in the config, leading me to write this Hitler parody (and move to vimperator/vimfx): https://youtube.com/watch?v=taGARf8K5J8 https://youtube.com/watch?v=taGARf8K5J8 [1] even registered tyrannyofthemouse.com [2] I would have have heard about vim sooner but for not having much contact with programmers
- hackuser 10y ago
  > about six months ago, Firefox banned unsigned addons If you use other Firefox editions besides the standard one then you still can use unsigned addons, based on what I've read. [0] The other editions include ESR, nightlies, Developer, and Unbranded. Of course, these editions are not intended for most end-users. [0] https://wiki.mozilla.org/Addons/Extension_Signing https://wiki.mozilla.org/Addons/Extension_Signing

li4ick 10y ago

The one and only reason that stops me from using Vimperator is the smooth scrolling feature, which is built into Vimium. Does anybody know how to get the same behaviour into Vimperator?

chimeracoder 10y ago

I love Vimperator - unfortunately, it's incompatible with e10s (multiprocess Firefox) and it is also completely dependent on the deprecated XUL. Replacing that would essentially be a ground-up rewrite[0]. It looks like Vimperator is likely not going to be updated to work with newer versions of Firefox, which is a real shame, because it works far better than any alternative I've found for either Firefox or Chrome. I even made my own with the new Firefox API to see if I could replicate the experience, but it's tough[1]. The WebExtension interface doesn't give the same level of control that XUL did, and without which it's hard to give the same feel of Vimperator. [0] https://github.com/vimperator/vimperator-labs/issues/211 https://github.com/vimperator/vimperator-labs/issues/211 [1] https://github.com/ChimeraCoder/electrovim https://github.com/ChimeraCoder/electrovim

richardboegli 10y ago
Try Pale Moon.
wsha 10y ago
I have followed the situation fairly closely, and I agree with your assessment. I haven't seen anything that makes me think either Pentadactyl or Vimperator will survive the deprecation of XUL. The most promising vim-like addon is VimFx (followed by the Chrome addons like Vimium and cVim which maybe will work in Firefox one day as WebExtensions -- I try on Nightly every couple months but they don't work so far). The reason I say this is that it has active development and developers committed to the WebExtensions transition (plus has less features so it is easier to port). You can follow the progress here: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1215061 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1215061 https://github.com/lydell/webextension-keyboard https://github.com/lydell/webextension-keyboard

Morantron 10y ago

Also, if you want a similar behavior for copy pasting in terminal, check this tmux plugin: https://github.com/morantron/tmux-fingers https://github.com/morantron/tmux-fingers </shameless-plug>

protomikron 10y ago

Is it possible (in VimFX) to remap the (Shift) Escape? E.g. in my ~/.vimrc I use imap jj <ESC> How users can live with Vim's default behavior (Escape, Ctrl-C, Ctrl-[) is mysterious to me (I do not like hitting Ctrl). :)

wsha 10y ago
You can't categorically remap some key sequence to Escape in VimFx (not sure if you meant Vimperator where you can do this just like in vim). However, you can open the preference and add whatever alternative you want to all of the commands that are mapped to Escape by default.
citisincyber 10y ago
system bind caps -> ctrl. reduce stress on the pinky
- protomikron 10y ago
  I may give that a try again, however 'jj' was more natural for me.

Mauricio_ 10y ago

There's also Vimium for Chrome. Not sure how similar they are, but the only feature that matters about Vimium is pressing the F key, which allows you to open links without using the mouse. It's the greatest idea I've seen and it should be a native feature of major browsers.

rvern 10y ago
It is, people just don't know about it (it seems?). In Firefox, just press '/'. You can also toggle 'Search for text when I start typing' in about:preferences#advanced.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- michaelmrose 10y ago
  Totally not even remotely the same thing. You need to type several times as many characters in the best case and it will select the first instance of a string even if it's nowhere near your cursor. Additionaly you can't search for links that are graphics
  - rvern 10y ago
    Actually, it doesn't select the first instance in the document but rather the first after your cursor. And you can use ' instead of / to select only links. It allows you to open links without using the mouse, so saying it is not exactly the same thing would be more accurate than saying it is "not even remotely the same thing."
    - michaelmrose 10y ago
      It is sufficiently poor as not to be worth using as it would only work part of the time and would be more effort than using the mouse.

spicytunacone 10y ago

Been contently using Vimperator for at least a good year now (coming from VimFX), but I'm trying to find something to jump ship to once support drops. It's going to suck losing Rikaisama and uMatrix/uBO. Between the idiomatic :o/:tabopen <se-keyword> searching, marks, recording and buffer management, a simple Vi-like navigation extension can't compare. The fact that there's a .vimperatorrc might be overkill for some, but, like any dotfile, a boon for others. If Vimperator had splits I'd probably stay on some compatible fork.

akurilin 10y ago

Any of you figured out how to get vimperator / pentadactyl to work with all of the SPAs that have their own shortcuts? e.g. Asana or Reviewable or Gmail etc? I've always had a pretty bad time with combining those. Also, is there a solid Chrome version of any of the above?

CaptSpify 10y ago
This is a big issue for me. Every stinking website thinks it's a good idea to use crappy inconsistent keyboard shortcuts, but don't have a way to turn them off.
wsha 10y ago
I'm not sure what SPAs are or what Asana or Reviewable are, but I have happily used gmail with Pentadactyl by using passkeys. This is what I have in my passkeys setting for gmail: '^https?://(mail|groups)\.google\.com':raNxujkopnczIU/#vl?<UP><DOWN>,gi,gt,gd,gl,

dvcrn 10y ago

I wanted to try Vimperator multiple multiple times but every single time I installed it, it didn't work for some reason. Either Firefox introduced some breaking change that made Vimperator unusable or I received error messages that through a session of Googling I couldn't fix.

rvern 10y ago

If you just want to use your web browser more efficiently, from the keyboard, you don't need addons like Vimperator or VimFX. Firefox already has keyboard shortcuts for everything. You can press Alt+H K to see the list of keyboard shortcuts. You can press Ctrl+L to select the location bar, Ctrl+K to select the search bar. You can set browser.search.openintab if you want searches from the search bar to open in a new tab and keyword.enabled to false if you don't want the location bar to be used for searches. You can press / and type text to select any text with the Quick Find bar,[1] or press ' to select only links. You can use Ctrl+G or F3 in the Quick Find bar to go to the next occurrence of your search and Shift+Ctrl+G or Shift+F3 to go to the previous occurrence. You can use smart bookmarks to go quickly to any website or make searches on any website by putting %s in a bookmark URL and adding a keyword which can be used from the address bar.[2] You can even add keywords that will do POST requests with the 'Add a Keyword for this Search...' context menu item for search fields.[3] There are also many keyboard shortcuts for editing and selecting text in text fields, which have the benefit of being the same in most applications on all platforms. There's a list on Wikipedia.[4] There are keyboard shortcuts even for the more obscure features, like Ctrl+Alt+R to enable reader mode and Ctrl+M to mute or unmute the current tab. Your web browser already has good keyboard shortcuts, you just need to learn them. [1]: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/search-contents-current-page-text-or-links#w_quick-find https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/search-contents-current... [2]: http://kb.mozillazine.org/Bookmark_Keywords http://kb.mozillazine.org/Bookmark_Keywords [3]: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-search-from-address-bar https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-search-from-address... [4]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_of_keyboard_shortcuts#Text_editing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_of_keyboard_shortcuts#Te...

travv0 10y ago
Serious question: Is there a way to scroll without using the arrow keys, scroll by pages without PgUp/PgDn, etc? I didn't see anything in the links you provided, and those buttons aren't very convenient on most keyboards I've used.
- rvern 10y ago
  Yep. You can use Space to scroll a page down and Shift+Space to scroll a page up. For more precise scrolling, though, you will have to use the arrow keys or the mouse.

sudarshan_sar 10y ago

This is a great plugin and I love being able to open URLs and search google, amazon etc without actually visiting the landing page first - like hitting 'o-g <search>' or 'o-a <search>' for example. However with the support for multiprocess not being there, I decided to move on to vimfx which is somewhat more minimalistic and less easily configurable compared to vimperator, but in my experience so far it is really smooth even though it lacks that particular feature(among others) that I highlighted earlier in the comment(well not entirely, you can still google search in a similar way). Overall though vimperator was/is a great plugin, especially for people who are really used to vim and hate switching to mouse for browsing the web.

autocorr 10y ago
That's something I ran into as well, but actually has had a solution in vanilla Firefox for a while. You can create keywords for searches by right clicking a search box and selecting "add keyword for this search", and can then be used in just the same as vimperator by typing that keyword into the navigation/awesome bar (such as with VimFX). One advantage to this is that you can create a bookmark folder of search keywords, and they'll sync across all your devices thru Firefox sync. I find this especially handy on Firefox mobile.
- wsha 10y ago
  This is a nice feature. The downsides compared to Vimperator/Pentadactyl is that you can tab-complete the search term and you can't get search suggestions as you type (or at least I haven't gotten either of these things to work).

anhari 10y ago

I just discovered Vimperator a few weeks ago, and I am really enjoying it thus far. I love the fact that it can be customized with a dot file, and I have implemented some really useful leader keys that I have come to really rely on. So far I've set up some resizing the window and accessing various dev tools: http://anhari.io/2017/01/10/vimming-around-in-firefox.html http://anhari.io/2017/01/10/vimming-around-in-firefox.html