Vim

I’ve been using vim for more than 10 years. Here are a list of things I usually forget from time to time that are extremely useful.

• You can use gi in normal mode to start inserting in the last position you inserted even if you have moved through the buffer.
• To emulate the power of multiple cursors we can make use of the cgn text object:
  • Search a word with / or *
  • Use cgn to change the word
  • Use dot repeat to keep going or use gn so skip a word
• Fuzzy find files with :find *. This works on other directories as well, not only the root :find ../../../**/woah
• Use :b whatever to switch to an open buffer in vim with a whatever substring in the file name.
• Tags navigation is awesome:
  • Go to next tag: C-]
  • Find ambiguous tag: gC-]
  • Go back: C-t
• We don’t necessarily need completion plugins. Instead here are some commands for more powerful completion:
  • Simple completion with: C-n or C-p
  • Restrict to current file: C-x C-n or C-x C-p
  • Complete only file names: C-x C-f
  • Restrict to tags only: C-x C-]
  • Use omnicompletion C-x C-o
  • Complete definition: C-x C-d
  • Complete from included file: C-x C-i
  • Complete line already present in file: C-x C-l
• Working with the quickfix window:
  • Open it with: :copen
  • Open it only if there are errors, otherwise close it: :cw
  • Close it: :ccl
  • Go to next error: :cn
  • Go to previous error: :cp
  • Filter entries by a pattern with: :Cfilter or for exclusion :Cfilter!
  • Execute an action on the items from the quickix: :cdo s/foo/bar/ | update
  • When on the quickfix window, press <CR> to open on the top window or <C-W><CR> to open on a new window.
• Use gf to open the file under the cursor.
• You can use vim as a mergetool, if configured: git mergetool
  • Move to merge conflict on the bottom window
  • Keep local changes with :diffget LOCAL or :diffg LO
  • Keep local changes with :diffget REMOTE or :diffg RE
  • Navigate conflicts with C-w,j
  • After saving, commit the changes.
• Searching files is amazing with just grep or vimgrep commands. They all fill the quickfix window.
  • Search local buffer: :vimgrep /pattern/ %
  • Search from the current working directory: :vimgrep /pattern/ ** or :Vimgrep /pattern/
  • Use an external tool for grepping (i.e. ripgrep): :Grep /pattern/
  • Use :Ggrep if interested only in filtering by the files on the git repository.
• Using the plugin vim-unimpaired is very practical:
  • Jump between quickfix items: ]q or [q
  • Jump between spelling errors: ]s or [s
  • Add space before/after the line: ]<space> or ]<space>
  • Jump between buffers: ]b or [b
  • Jump between files in the directory: ]f or [f
  • Exchange lines up/down: ]e or [e
• Increase/decrease numbers by using <C-A> and <C-X> respectively.

Resources

• At least one vim trick you might not know (Hillel)