VIM cheat sheet

I am closing down my old blog on socketwiz.com and I didn't have much content over there and this was and article I felt like preserving.

Since I have been using Vim almost exclusively lately I made myself a cheat sheet to help me remember some stuff. This is certainly not an exhaustive list, just some things that I don’t know how to do off the top of my head that I wrote down and ended up getting a little carried away. Just thought I would share:

Motions

motion	description
h	Count characters left
l	Count characters right
^	To the first character of the line.
$	To the last character of the line.
f	To the counth character occurrence to the right. F to the counth character occurrence to the left.
t	To 1 character just before the counth character occurrence to the right.
T	To 1 character just before the counth character occurrence to the left.
w	Count words forward.
W	Count words forward (different definition for what a word is, includes special characters and such.)
e	Count forward to the end of word.
b	Count words backward.

trigger	effect
c{motion}	Change
d{motion}	Delete
y{motion}	Yank into register
g~{motion}	Toggle case
gu{motion}	Make lowercase
gU{motion}	Make uppercase
>{motion}	Shift right
<g{motion}	Shift left
={motion}	Auto-indent

Buffer management

command	description
<C-^> or	Switch to the buffer you just left.

Split windows

command	description
s or :sp[lit]	Split file horizontally.
v or :vsp[lit]	Split file vertically.
w	Cycle between open windows.
h	Focus the window to the left.
j	Focus the window below.
k	Focus the window above.
l	Focus the window to the right.
:cl[ose] c	Close the active window.
:on[ly] o	Keep only the active window, closing all others.

Spelling

command	description
:setlocal spell	Enable spell checker
]s	Jump to next spelling error.
[s	Jump to previous spelling error.
z=	Suggest corrections for current word.
zg	Add the current word to spell file.
zw	Remove the current word from spell file.

Code folding

command	description
zf{motion}	Folds code when "foldmethod" set to manual or "marker".
za	Toggle fold at cursor.
zo	Opens fold at cursor.
zc	Close fold at cursor.
zR	Open all.
zM	Close all.

Search and replace

command	description
:args */.txt	Multi-file Step 1) populate the argument list with the files you want to search.
:argdo %s/search/replace/gc	Mult-file Step 2) replace all occurrences of search with replace but prompt before doing so.
*	Search for the word under the cursor.

Jumps

command	description
:jumps	Display the jump list.
	Jump backwards through the jump list.
	Jump forwards through the jump list.
:changes	Display the change list.
g;	Jump backwards through the changes list.
g,	Jump forwards through the changes list.
gf	jump to the file name under the cursor.

Marks

command	description
:marks	Display the marks list.
m	Set a file bookmark.
m	Set a buffer bookmark.
'	Jump to the mark.
''	Jump to the line in the current buffer where jumped from.
:delmarks	Delete specified mark.
:delmarks a-d	Delete marks a through d
:delmarks a,b,x,y	Delete only marks a,b,x and y.
:delmarks!	Delete all lower case marks.

Registers

command	description
:registers	Display the register list.
"{motion}	Overwrite or use contents of register.
"{motion}	Append or use contents of register.
0	Populated with last yanked text.

Macros

command	description
q{register}	Start recording and store it in the specified register.
q	Stop recording.
{count}@{register}	Execute specified macro count times.

Sessions

command	description
:mksession /path/to/session.vim	A Session keeps the Views for all windows, plus the global settings.
:source /path/to/session.vim	Open a session from within Vim.
vim -S /path/to/session.vim	Start Vim with a session.

Quickfix window

command	description
:copen	Open the quickfix window.
:ccl	Close it.
:cw	Open it if there are "errors", close it otherwise (some people prefer this).
:cn	Go to the next error in the window.
:cnf	Go to the first error in the next file.
:cc{num}	Go to the error by number.

key	move to
%	End of construct
[[	Backwards to the beginning of the current function.
][	Forwards to the beginning of the current function.
]}	Beginning of the current block.
[{	End of the current block.
}[	Beginning of the current comment block.
}]	End of the current comment block.
gd	First usage of the current variable name. (Mnemonic: go to definition).
gD	Go to the first global usage of the current variable name.
gg	Beginning of file.
G	End of file.

Help

key	move to
~~<C-]>~~	follow link
	jump back

Addon References

ctrlp.vim https://github.com/kien/ctrlp.vim

command	description
CtrlP	Invoke ctrl-p in file mode.
F5	Purge the cache for the current directory.
	Cycle between modes.
	Switch to filename instead of full path.
	Switch to regex mode.
	Navigate the result list.
..	To go up the directory tree.
:	Excute command against the file.
:	Jump to line number.

Tcomment https://github.com/tomtom/tcomment_vim

command	description
gc{motion}	Toggle comments (for small comments within one line the &filetype_inline style will be used, if defined).
gcc	Toggle comment for the current line.
C{motion}	Comment region.
Cc	Comment the current line.
	:TComment.
b	:TCommentBlock.

vim-fugitive https://github.com/tpope/vim-fugitive

command	description
Gstatus	git status (- to add/reset changes)
Gcommit	git commit
Gmove	git move
Gremove	git rm
Ggrep	git grep
Glog	git log
Gbrowse	open current file on Github
Git	run arbitrary git command

vim-surround https://github.com/tpope/vim-surround

command	description
cs	Change old delimeter to new.
ds	Remove delimeters.
ysiw	Wrap current word.
S	While in visual mode.

gitgutter https://github.com/airblade/vim-gitgutter

command	description
[h	Previous hunk
]h	Next hunk

Miscellaneous

command	description
v	Enable characterwise Visual mode.
	Enable linewise Visual mode.
	Enable blockwise Visual mode.
gv	Reselect the last visual selection.
o	Go to other end of highlighted text.
"+p	Paste from system clipboard.
:0,$d	Delete every line in a file.
	Increment number.
	Decrement number.
vit	Select contents inside of an HTML tag.
:map	List all currently define mappings.
:verbose map	Display where mapping was defined.
g/{pattern}/d	Delete every line matching pattern.
v/{pattern}/d	Delete every line not matching pattern.
:w !sudo tee %	Save a file with sudo that you opened with proper permissions.
bufdo {command}	Execute specified command on every buffer.
{trigger}i{container}	Inside some container like brackets, tag, or parenthesis for example.
:e	Refresh or reload buffer

Merge Conflicts

(requires the fugitive plugin)

:Gdiff

Target      |       Working     |       Merge
//2                                     //3

[c and ]c to navigate between conflicts

:diffget //2 or //3
:diffupdate
:only
:wq

$ git add .
$ git commit -m 'message'

Build from source

$ cd ~
$ hg clone https://code.google.com/p/vim/
$ hg tags | grep less # find out what latest stable build is
$ hg checkout <latest_stable>
$ cd vim
$ ./configure --with-features=huge \
            --enable-rubyinterp \
            --enable-pythoninterp \
            --enable-gui=gtk2 --enable-cscope --prefix=/usr
$ make VIMRUNTIMEDIR=/opt/local/share/vim/vim73
$ make install

Tags: #dtrace #git

Categories: #technology