Just to throw in another $0.02... I use bufexplorer[1]. There's something about minbufexpl's list that seems unappealing to me when it spans multiple lines.

Just to throw in another $0.02... I use bufexplorer[1]. There's something about minbufexpl's list that seems unappealing to me when it spans multiple lines. I also have CTRL-j/CTRL-k mapped to :bnext/:bprev. As for closing a buffer, my main window generally has a single vertical split, so I have the following kludge: map <C-Q> :vert split<CR>:bnext<CR>:wincmd l<CR>:bdelete<CR> This creates another vertical window temporarily, advances to the next buffer in that window, activates the window to the right (which still shows the buffer I'm trying to kill), and then deletes that buffer leaving me with two windows again. Amusingly, my older machines were slow enough to catch a glimpse of the third window, but it disappears too quickly to see on my new machine. [1] http://vim.sourceforge.net/scripts/script.php?script_id=42 http://vim.sourceforge.net/scripts/script.php?script_id=42 edit: described kludge a bit better