5 ms·

I certainly like VIM, it's my default editor on non-Windows operating systems, but I really don't care one bit about the h,j,k,l keymapping; I can use my arrow

• zachgersh 13y ago
  This should get you comfortable with using the h,j,k,l mapping then. I actually turn arrow keys off in my vimrc, I can definitively say it is one of the things that has made me faster.
  • cyphax 13y ago
    Good point about using this to get me comfortable with the keymapping. I dunno if I'll get too depressed from dying over and over before I get the hang of it though! ;)
    • aith 13y ago
      Getting frustrated and depressed with keymapping? Sounds just like my experience using real vim ;)
  • oftenwrong 13y ago
    Do not turn them off; remap them! That is valuable keyboard real estate. I use them for buffer switching, since I do that frequently. Left and right change to the next and previous buffers, respectively. Down to quickly swap to the previously focused buffer. Up to bring up a buffer switch menu. Here are the .vimrc lines: " Arrow keys for buffer switching nnoremap <left> :bprev<cr> nnoremap <right> :bnext<cr> nnoremap <down> :buffer #<cr> nnoremap <up> :buffers<cr>:buffer<space>
    • zachgersh 13y ago
      Such a good call! I don't use buffers enough :)
    • jonahx 13y ago
      Great tip!
• harrytuttle 13y ago
  Just to state some support for this: I have used vim for over a decade and I haven't used hjkl on a good day once. Arrow keys are fine. Occasionally I use hjkl if the terminal is set up wrongly or it's a broken vi implementation but that's it.
  • yogo 13y ago
    Interesting. I'm curious as to how and what you use vim for. I find it hard to believe that anyone would seriously do something like d + down arrow with dj available. All of those seconds (it takes me more than a second to go to the arrows then back to home row) add up over time.
    • Patrick_Devine 13y ago
      You would use 'dd' instead which is faster since you don't have to have make sure your other hand is in the correct position.
      • yogo 13y ago
        My example involved deleting two lines, which you can accomplish with '2dd', 'dj', 'dddd', etc. When my hands are on my keyboard 'dj' is my personal preference. The parent poster was using arrow keys so naturally I'm wondering if for something like 'dj' he/she would use 'd + down arrow' since that seems like waste of time. It's a somewhat contrived example to see how far some users take the use of the arrow keys, which you quickly realize are not necessary in vim.
    • harrytuttle 13y ago
      I have a ThinkPad. The keys are closer together. Used for most editing tasks. Those seconds are fractional compared to thinking time before cutting code. I'm not paid in words per minute. w, g, / are used more than the arrows anyway.
    • bitcrusher 13y ago
      It depends on your keyboard as well. I use a Kinesis Advantage, which has the arrow keys in a place that doesn't require movement from your hands, so hjkl doesn't provide the advantage that it used to.
• jonahx 13y ago
  You're missing a ton of vim's value by doing that. The reason for those key mappings is so that your hands can remain in standard "typing ready" position, so that you can both type and navigate without moving your hands. If you are moving away to the arrow keys, at that point you're one step away from just navigating by mouse: it's really missing the point.
  • eckzow 13y ago
    I don't know about "a ton" -- there are far better ways to move around a file than mashing hjkl, even with numbered versions (vim-easymotion, vim-seek). Once you can get to the right place in the file I almost never use hjkl with an action, but rather text objects or motions like ci" or dt;
    • swift 13y ago
      I've started to use relative line numbering (numbers.vim is highly recommended) and that has made me use 'j' and 'k' in motions quite frequently. I wish I had made the change earlier!
• JimmaDaRustla 13y ago
  I got the pitch forks, who has the torches?