6 ms·

Best of Vim Tips

273 points by adulau 15y ago

ljs 15y ago
This has been my primary means of learning vim. Most of the web resources I've learnt from have been verbose and gradually introduced new ideas (i.e. the advanced bash scripting guide, or any of Steve's rants). I've been hooked on OP for it's terseness and challenging obscurity; which I guess suits the subject matter.
- clay 15y ago
  An awesome way to learn new tricks is to hack with another vim user
  - bostonvaulter2 15y ago
    Or vim golf if there are no users nearby.
BasDirks 15y ago
I find that terse resources like this (and for example Code Like a Pythonista: Idiomatic Python[1]) are the best learning resources. A true goldmine. [1]: http://python.net/~goodger/projects/pycon/2007/idiomatic/handout.html http://python.net/~goodger/projects/pycon/2007/idiomatic/han...
- aoe 15y ago
  Agreed. But this page could certainly make use of some whitespace, to be more readable.
  - phatbyte 15y ago
    Agreed as well
  - ryanbraganza 15y ago
    The PDF linked at the bottom is a little more palatable. http://gav.brokentrain.net/projects/vimtips/vimtips.pdf http://gav.brokentrain.net/projects/vimtips/vimtips.pdf
  - Toenex 15y ago
    Page is best viewed in VIM.
dudus 15y ago
I believe this is the worst Vim Tips compilation I have ever seen. Utterly complicated commands with no real life examples. Also doesn't explain the difference between commands, motion commands and selectors. Which are crucial to the starter Vim user. If you are an experienced Vim user, this might be a handy cheat sheet. If you're new to Vim, go look somewhere else.
- vdoma 15y ago
  Most of these are very useful and definitely real-world examples. I agree it's not for total beginners, but the page never makes such a claim.
  - secoif 15y ago
    I think the parent was asking for real world usage examples over contrived tom/dick/harry examples.
- mmorey 15y ago
  Can you provide a link to something better? As a novice VIM user I can't get enough of these resources.
  - telemachos 15y ago
    A bunch of things I like, in no particular order. Vimcasts: http://vimcasts.org/ http://vimcasts.org/ (And keep your eye out for Drew's forthcoming book: Practical Vim.) Vim University: http://vimuniversity.com/ http://vimuniversity.com/ Coming Home To Vim: http://stevelosh.com/blog/2010/09/coming-home-to-vim/ http://stevelosh.com/blog/2010/09/coming-home-to-vim/ Efficient Editing With Vim: http://robertames.com/files/vim-editing.html http://robertames.com/files/vim-editing.html Why, oh WHY, do those #?@! nutheads use vi?: http://www.viemu.com/a-why-vi-vim.html http://www.viemu.com/a-why-vi-vim.html Your problem with Vim is that you don't grok vi: http://stackoverflow.com/a/1220118/26702 http://stackoverflow.com/a/1220118/26702 Vim anti-patterns: http://blog.sanctum.geek.nz/tag/anti-patterns/ http://blog.sanctum.geek.nz/tag/anti-patterns/
  - 15y ago
pg_bot 15y ago
The only thing I have hated about learning vim, is the god awful styling of every resource related to it. Every article or piece of documentation is a big wall o' text with no effort put into styling or separating content. This has surprised me since I don't believe that the set of competent designers and vim users are mutually exclusive.
- swah 15y ago
  I feel like that about Java.
- gnosis 15y ago
  Maybe you haven't seen this: http://www.viemu.com/a_vi_vim_graphical_cheat_sheet_tutorial.html http://www.viemu.com/a_vi_vim_graphical_cheat_sheet_tutorial...
  - johncoltrane 15y ago
    This cheat sheet is horrible. Subjectively and objectively: * Bold fonts everywhere without enough vertical space: bold is for important stuff, not for copy text and the lack of vertical spacing makes the whole thing hard to parse. * Keychars centered vertically instead of placed on a common baseline. * Meanings of keys centered horizontally: considered very hard to read since forever. * No explanation for `WORD`: is it for uppercase words? (yes, I know the answer) * Instead of being logically grouped, the commands and motions are tied to the spatial location of their key: the logic and grammar behind most of Vim is hidden in profit of an opaque, maximalist and almost unreadable mess. * Focus is put on raw memory instead of intelligence and acquiring instant exhaustive knowledge instead of learning naturally. * QWERTY is only one of many keyboard layout standards: a lot of the keys represented here are located elsewhere in french AZERTY or other layouts. This has one important consequence: the physical location of the keys bound to each command/motion is not linked at all to the name of the command or its mnemonic or to anything relevant. Because `A` can be anywhere, learning the physical location of "Append at eol" on this specific keyboard layout or on any other makes no sense at all. But we obviously don't all learn the same way.
ralph 15y ago
This is something to skim and spot bits you didn’t know, leading you to the relevant bit of the fine manual. It has errors though, e.g. /\<\d\d\d\d\> : Search for exactly 4 digit numbers /\D\d\d\d\d\D : Search for exactly 4 digit numbers /\<\d\{4}\> : same thing The middle one is not the same as the other two since \D has to match something unlike the zero-width assertions of \< and \> for beginning and end of word.
tambourine_man 15y ago
I don't know how many times I've hit this link from random googling. Just like this sed one liners: http://www.eng.cam.ac.uk/help/tpl/unix/sed.html http://www.eng.cam.ac.uk/help/tpl/unix/sed.html
ramblerman 15y ago
very nice, what I particularly liked was : d/fred/ :delete until fred y/fred/ :yank until fred c/fred/e : change untill fred I actually prefer this over ctf, dtf as it scales better

273 points by adulau 15y ago

ljs 15y ago

This has been my primary means of learning vim. Most of the web resources I've learnt from have been verbose and gradually introduced new ideas (i.e. the advanced bash scripting guide, or any of Steve's rants). I've been hooked on OP for it's terseness and challenging obscurity; which I guess suits the subject matter.

clay 15y ago
An awesome way to learn new tricks is to hack with another vim user
- bostonvaulter2 15y ago
  Or vim golf if there are no users nearby.

BasDirks 15y ago

I find that terse resources like this (and for example Code Like a Pythonista: Idiomatic Python[1]) are the best learning resources. A true goldmine. [1]: http://python.net/~goodger/projects/pycon/2007/idiomatic/handout.html http://python.net/~goodger/projects/pycon/2007/idiomatic/han...

aoe 15y ago
Agreed. But this page could certainly make use of some whitespace, to be more readable.
- phatbyte 15y ago
  Agreed as well
- ryanbraganza 15y ago
  The PDF linked at the bottom is a little more palatable. http://gav.brokentrain.net/projects/vimtips/vimtips.pdf http://gav.brokentrain.net/projects/vimtips/vimtips.pdf
- Toenex 15y ago
  Page is best viewed in VIM.

dudus 15y ago

I believe this is the worst Vim Tips compilation I have ever seen. Utterly complicated commands with no real life examples. Also doesn't explain the difference between commands, motion commands and selectors. Which are crucial to the starter Vim user. If you are an experienced Vim user, this might be a handy cheat sheet. If you're new to Vim, go look somewhere else.

vdoma 15y ago
Most of these are very useful and definitely real-world examples. I agree it's not for total beginners, but the page never makes such a claim.
- secoif 15y ago
  I think the parent was asking for real world usage examples over contrived tom/dick/harry examples.
mmorey 15y ago
Can you provide a link to something better? As a novice VIM user I can't get enough of these resources.
- telemachos 15y ago
  A bunch of things I like, in no particular order. Vimcasts: http://vimcasts.org/ http://vimcasts.org/ (And keep your eye out for Drew's forthcoming book: Practical Vim.) Vim University: http://vimuniversity.com/ http://vimuniversity.com/ Coming Home To Vim: http://stevelosh.com/blog/2010/09/coming-home-to-vim/ http://stevelosh.com/blog/2010/09/coming-home-to-vim/ Efficient Editing With Vim: http://robertames.com/files/vim-editing.html http://robertames.com/files/vim-editing.html Why, oh WHY, do those #?@! nutheads use vi?: http://www.viemu.com/a-why-vi-vim.html http://www.viemu.com/a-why-vi-vim.html Your problem with Vim is that you don't grok vi: http://stackoverflow.com/a/1220118/26702 http://stackoverflow.com/a/1220118/26702 Vim anti-patterns: http://blog.sanctum.geek.nz/tag/anti-patterns/ http://blog.sanctum.geek.nz/tag/anti-patterns/
- 15y ago

pg_bot 15y ago

The only thing I have hated about learning vim, is the god awful styling of every resource related to it. Every article or piece of documentation is a big wall o' text with no effort put into styling or separating content. This has surprised me since I don't believe that the set of competent designers and vim users are mutually exclusive.

swah 15y ago
I feel like that about Java.
gnosis 15y ago
Maybe you haven't seen this: http://www.viemu.com/a_vi_vim_graphical_cheat_sheet_tutorial.html http://www.viemu.com/a_vi_vim_graphical_cheat_sheet_tutorial...
- johncoltrane 15y ago
  This cheat sheet is horrible. Subjectively and objectively: * Bold fonts everywhere without enough vertical space: bold is for important stuff, not for copy text and the lack of vertical spacing makes the whole thing hard to parse. * Keychars centered vertically instead of placed on a common baseline. * Meanings of keys centered horizontally: considered very hard to read since forever. * No explanation for `WORD`: is it for uppercase words? (yes, I know the answer) * Instead of being logically grouped, the commands and motions are tied to the spatial location of their key: the logic and grammar behind most of Vim is hidden in profit of an opaque, maximalist and almost unreadable mess. * Focus is put on raw memory instead of intelligence and acquiring instant exhaustive knowledge instead of learning naturally. * QWERTY is only one of many keyboard layout standards: a lot of the keys represented here are located elsewhere in french AZERTY or other layouts. This has one important consequence: the physical location of the keys bound to each command/motion is not linked at all to the name of the command or its mnemonic or to anything relevant. Because `A` can be anywhere, learning the physical location of "Append at eol" on this specific keyboard layout or on any other makes no sense at all. But we obviously don't all learn the same way.

ralph 15y ago

This is something to skim and spot bits you didn’t know, leading you to the relevant bit of the fine manual. It has errors though, e.g. /\<\d\d\d\d\> : Search for exactly 4 digit numbers /\D\d\d\d\d\D : Search for exactly 4 digit numbers /\<\d\{4}\> : same thing The middle one is not the same as the other two since \D has to match something unlike the zero-width assertions of \< and \> for beginning and end of word.

tambourine_man 15y ago

I don't know how many times I've hit this link from random googling. Just like this sed one liners: http://www.eng.cam.ac.uk/help/tpl/unix/sed.html http://www.eng.cam.ac.uk/help/tpl/unix/sed.html

ramblerman 15y ago

very nice, what I particularly liked was : d/fred/ :delete until fred y/fred/ :yank until fred c/fred/e : change untill fred I actually prefer this over ctf, dtf as it scales better