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Intermediate Vim

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Re: Intermediate Vim

#22

Post by isostatic »

preommr wrote: post #18
knolax wrote: post #3

As a Vim user one of my gripes when first using Vim was how cumbersome the built in help files were. I guess that's why there are so many "vim cheatsheets" out there, the built in documentation is a pain to use.

The biggest pain in vim is the escape key. And no, ctrl+[ isn't any better.

I have capslock mapped to escape and never notice which one I use (started doing that after my escape key broke on a laptop about 15 years ago)

I believe people with poor keyboards don't even have escape keys any more though

Re: Intermediate Vim

#23

Post by isostatic »

The defaults in vim 8 in debian and ubuntu really changed the way vim worked, it was horrendous

As far as I'm concerned, the following is an non-negotiable requirement for vimrc.

  source /usr/share/vim/vim80/defaults.vim
  set noincsearch
  set scrolloff=0
  set mouse=

Re: Intermediate Vim

#24

Post by weavie »

jnurmine wrote: post #16

Maybe you can cover macros since they are conceptually very simple and very powerful. They may seem a bit complex but are quite simple. Basically you just record your editing movements and play it back. How macros work: press q x to record and q to end. Then repeat with @ x, where x is the name of the macro you want to use (you can have several macros). Anything you do will be played back. That's it... Conceptually s…

I was going to say that one annoying thing about these macros is you can't press . to repeat the last macro. It is annoying having to count out 143 lines and then do 143@x or what I tend to do is do it in batches of say 20 until I get to the end..

But this has prompted me to look this up and it turns out that you can use @@ to do this. This will make my life a lot easier, I can just smash until all my lines are updated.

Re: Intermediate Vim

#25

Post by patrickdavey »

preommr wrote: post #18
knolax wrote: post #3

As a Vim user one of my gripes when first using Vim was how cumbersome the built in help files were. I guess that's why there are so many "vim cheatsheets" out there, the built in documentation is a pain to use.

The biggest pain in vim is the escape key. And no, ctrl+[ isn't any better.

I added this very handy little mapping a while back:

noremap! kj

it means when you press kj [0] that it's the same as pressing escape.. very handy (the times when I deliberately want to press k and then j are still zero)

[0] https://github.com/patrickdavey/dotfiles/blob/335254dce90d5c...

Re: Intermediate Vim

#26

Post by KhoomeiK »

TIL I'm an intermediate user of Vim! /s

I think this is pretty basic in terms of general vim commands. Navigation and insertion are all basic use cases that beginners should know. That said, the section about composing commands was really interesting!

Re: Intermediate Vim

#27

Post by jhoh »

dhotson wrote: post #6

Hey all, I'm the author. Feedback is welcome! :) The reason I wrote this is because I've been pair programming quite a bit lately and also mentoring some new vim users—so I wrote this little guide to help vim beginners level up their skills a bit. What I noticed is that a lot of vim beginners find composing commands and text-objects to be kind of mind blowing.. and even more experienced vim users mentioned that these…

Great article! The features you showed were some of the ones I've had my first "Oh, now I get why vim is so great"-moments and that really boost your productivity.

> Tip: Generally after you’ve inserted some text, you want to return to command mode so that you’re ready to enter your next command. I’d recommend pressing esc any time you’ve finished typing.

Totally agree with this. What really helped me with getting this into my muscle memory was remapping Capslock to ESC which seems to be what many (most?) vim users do.

Re: Intermediate Vim

#28

Post by jwilk »

isostatic wrote: post #22
preommr wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The biggest pain in vim is the escape key. And no, ctrl+[ isn't any better.

I have capslock mapped to escape and never notice which one I use (started doing that after my escape key broke on a laptop about 15 years ago) I believe people with poor keyboards don't even have escape keys any more though

What do you mean by "poor keyboards"?

Re: Intermediate Vim

#29

Post by timrichard »

dhotson wrote: post #6

Hey all, I'm the author. Feedback is welcome! :) The reason I wrote this is because I've been pair programming quite a bit lately and also mentoring some new vim users—so I wrote this little guide to help vim beginners level up their skills a bit. What I noticed is that a lot of vim beginners find composing commands and text-objects to be kind of mind blowing.. and even more experienced vim users mentioned that these…

Nice checklist...

I'm not quite convinced about this as general advice :

> If you’re like me and never learned to touch type properly, just use the arrow keys, it’s fine, don’t worry about it.

When I decided to go all-in on Vim keys some time ago (trying to find plugins for everything), it didn't take long to transition to hjkl. I think it's easier and more convenient to stay near the home row rather than moving my hand over for the arrows. I don't strictly touch type either.

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