100 vim commands that programmers should know

Since 1970s, Vi has been one of the best programmers. no matter you are a beginner or veteran of Vi, the following section provides 100 useful Vi commands, which I believe will be helpful to you. Basics: efilenameOpenfilenameforedition: wSavefile: qExitVim: w! E...

 

Since 1970s, Vi has been one of the best programmers. no matter you are a beginner or veteran of Vi, the following section provides 100 useful Vi commands, which I believe will be helpful to you.
 

Basics

 

: E filename	OpenFilenameFor edition
: W	Save file
: Q	Exit Vim
: W!	Exit Vim without saving

 

Search

 

/Word	SearchWordFrom top to bottom
? Word	SearchWordFrom bottom to top
/Jo [ha] n	SearchJohnOrJoan
/\ <	Search the, theater orThen
/The \>	SearchTheOrBreathe
/\ <The \>	SearchThe
/\ <Rule. \>	Search all words of 4 letters
/\/	SearchFredBut notAlfredOrFrederick
/Fred \ | joe	SearchFredOrJoe
/\ <\ D \>	Search exactly 4 digits
/^ \ N \ {3}	Find 3 empty lines
: Bufdo/searchstr/	Search in all open files

 

Replace

 

: % S/old/new/g	Replace all occurencesOldByNewIn file
: % S/old/new/gw	Replace all occurences with confirmation
: 2, 35 s/old/new/g	Replace all occurences between lines 2 and 35
: 5, $ s/old/new/g	Replace all occurences from line 5 to EOF
: % S/^/hello/g	Replace the begining of each lineHello
: % S/$/Harry/g	Replace the end of each lineHarry
: % S/onward/forward/gi	ReplaceOnwardByForward, Case unsensitive
: % S/* $ // g	Delete all white spaces
: G/string/d	Delete all lines containingString
: V/string/d	Delete all lines containing which didn't containString
: S/Bill/Steve/	Replace the first occurenceBillBySteveIn current line
: S/Bill/Steve/g	ReplaceBillBySteveIn current line
: % S/Bill/Steve/g	ReplaceBillBySteveIn all the file
: % S/\ r // g	Delete DOS carriage returns (^ M)
: % S/\ r/g	Transform DOS carriage returns in returns
: % S # <[^>] \ +> # g	Delete HTML tags but keeps text
: % S/^ \ (. * \) \ n \ 1 $/\ 1/	Delete lines which appears twice
Ctrl +	Increment number under the cursor
Ctrl + x	Decrement number under cursor
GgVGg?	Change text to Rot13

 

Case

 

Vu	Lowercase line
VU	Uppercase line
G ~~	Invert case
VEU	Switch word to uppercase
VE ~	Modify word case
GgguG	Set all text to lowercase
: Set ignorecase	Ignore case in searches
: Set smartcase	Ignore case in searches incluted if an uppercase letter is used
: % S/\ <./\ u &/g	Sets first letter of each word to uppercase
: % S/\ <./\ l &/g	Sets first letter of each word to lowercase
: % S/. */\ u &	Sets first letter of each line to uppercase
: % S/. */\ l &	Sets first letter of each line to lowercase

 

Read/Write files

 

: W outfile	Saves lines 1 to 10 inOutfile
: W> outfile	Appends lines 1 to 10Outfile
: R infile	Insert the contentInfile
: 23r infile	Insert the contentInfileUnder line 23

 

File explorer

 

: E.	Open integrated file explorer
: Sex	Split window and open integrated file explorer
: Browse e	Graphical file explorer
: Ls	List buffers
: Cd ..	Move to parent directory
: Args	List files
: Args *. php	Open file list
: Grep expression *. php	Returns a list of. php files conteningExpression
Gf	Open file name under cursor

 

Interact with Unix

 

:! Pwd	ExecutePwdUnix command, then returns to Vi
!! Pwd	ExecutePwdUnix command and insert output in file
: Sh	Temporary returns to Unix
$ Exit	Retourns to Vi

 

Alignment

 

: %! Fmt	Align all lines
!} Fmt	Align all lines at the current position
5 !! Fmt	Align the next 5 lines

 

Tabs

 

: Tabnew	Creates a new tab
Gt	Show next tab
: Tabfirst	Show first tab
: Tablast	Show last tab
: Tabm n (position)	Rearrange tabs
: Tabdo % s/foo/bar/g	Execute a command in all tabs
: Tab ball	Puts all open files in tabs

 

Window spliting

 

: E filename	EditFilenameIn current window
: Split filename	Split the window and openFilename
Ctrl-w up arrow	Puts cursor in top window
Ctrl-w	Puts cursor in next window
Ctrl-w _	Maximise current window
Ctrl-w =	Gives the same size to all windows
10 ctrl-w +	Add 10 lines to current window
: Vsplit file	Split window vertically
: Sview file	Same: SplitIn readonly mode
: Hide	Close current window
: ­ Nly	Close all windows, sorted Ted current
: B 2	Open #2 in this window

 

Auto-completion

 

Ctrl + n Ctrl + p (in insert mode)	Complete word
Ctrl + x Ctrl + l	Complete line
: Set dictionary = dict	DefineDictAs a dictionnary
Ctrl + x Ctrl + k	Complete with dictionnary

 

Marks

 

Mk	Marks current positionK
˜ K	Moves cursor to markK
D™K	Delete all until markK

 

Abbreviations

 

: AB mail mail@provider.org

DefineMailAs abbreviationMail@provider.org

 

Text indent

 

: Set autoindent	Turn on auto-indent
: Set smartindent	Turn on intelligent auto-indent
: Set shiftwidth = 4	Defines 4 spaces as indent size
Ctrl-t, ctrl-d	Indent/un-indent in insert mode
>	Indent
<	Un-indent

 

Syntax highlighting

 

: Syntax on	Turn on syntax highlighting
: Syntax off	Turn off syntax highlighting
: Set syntax = perl	Force syntax highlighting

 

From: BugZone-http://www.pulog.org/Resources/2290/vim-cmd