The History of hjkl

Back in the days of 1976 there was this thing. Some things never change!

Vim Tips

US Keyboard

Vim/Neovim works best with US keyboard layout. Even when you are used to a German keyboard layout, in some situations it might be useful to switch to this keyboard layout in the OS. Especially when you spend a lot of time in Vim.

Here is a short list of shifted keys: 1=! 2=@ 3=# 4=$ 5=% 6=^ 7=& 8=* 9=( 0=)

A differnt approach: Drop this line in your startup code to make better use of the umlaute keys set langmap=Ü?,ü/,ö[,ä],Ö{,Ä}.

Books

The web has a load of good Vim tutorials, covering how to use Vim and scripting tips.Here is a link to a very comprehensive online book: http://learnvimscriptthehardway.stevelosh.com

Open the commandline window

Sure, you can do : followed by a <C-f>. Or, sometimes more convinient, just press in normal mode q: for the command line or q/ or q? to enter the search window. The advantage to open one of these windows is that normal mode commands can be used.

Vim Knowledge in the WWW

• Vim wiki
• Vim Galore
• reedit

Wipe out a set of buffers

Want to wipe out all buffers in current session containing snap in its name? Just type :bw *snap<TAB><C-a><CR>. The <TAB> is required for take a quick look which buffers will be wiped-out. Another solution might be this:

:bufdo if expand("%") =~ '.*snap.*' | bw | endif

Use templates

Want to start new files with a template. Read more here :help template.

Custom Command Completion

Here is a Vim script to show custom completion of a new command:

function! CompleteFavPath(arg_lead, cmd_line, cur_pos)
  let l:matchingKeys = ""
  for k in sort(keys(g:workspacePathDict))
    if match(k, a:arg_lead) >= 0
      let l:matchingKeys .=  k . "\n"
    endif
  endfor
  return l:matchingKeys
endfunction

function! GotoFavPath(pathKey)
  if has_key(g:workspacePathDict, a:pathKey)
    exe "cd " . g:workspacePathDict[a:pathKey]
  endif
endfunction

let g:workspacePathDict = {"vim": "~\\vimfiles", "emacs": "~\\.emacs.d"}
command! -nargs=1 -complete=custom,CompleteFavPath WorkspacePath call GotoFavPath('<args>')

How to replace a word in lines im interested in?

For example, replace 'foo' to 'hey' if a line contains 'hi'. This line does the trick: :g/hi/ s/foo/hey/g

GREP

Vimgrep can run on any OS. But performance is somehow week. Speed up on recursive operation can be achieved by setting a proper value for option 'wildoptions' to ignore a set of sub-directories.

Even under Windows, grep-commands can run on bigger code basis even without any special tool. The method uses a kind of index-file with all C an H files. This file is used by Windows-standard program findstr. Works quit fast!

call writefile(split(globpath('.', '**/*.[ch]')), "files")
set gp=findstr\ /N\ /F:files 

A nice addition to spice up the :grep experience: Run :grep with the current word under cursor, highlighted in the results. Needs option hlsearch to be set.

nnoremap <Leader>g :let @/="<C-r><C-w>"<CR>:silent grep <C-r><C-w> . <CR> :cfirst<CR>

Ripgrep works very well on Windows. To setup Vim for rg use this set gp=rg\ --vimgrep\ -tc gfm=%f:%l:%c:%m.

Run shell commands

To run any shell command you can use :! {cmd}. Characters with a special meaning for Vim, line "%", gets expanded, befor the shell executes the command line. To avoid Vims character expansion, use quotes: "%"

Run shell commands 2

Here is an approach to use asynchronous processes:

Start the Job

function! RunMake(commandString)
    let l:opts = {
        \ 'close_cb':       function('s:JobHandler'),
        \ 'out_io':         'buffer',
        \ 'out_name':       "make.io",
        \ 'out_modifiable': 0,
        \ 'out_msg':        0,
        \ 'err_io':         'buffer',
        \ 'err_name':       "make.io",
        \ 'err_modifiable': 0,
        \ 'in_io':          'null'
            \ }
    if bufnr("make.io") >= 0
        bwipeout make.io
    endif
    let g:job = job_start("cmd /C " . a:commandString, l:opts)
endfunction

The Callback Function

function! s:JobHandler(handler)
    let l:cbufnr = bufnr("make.io")
    if l:cbufnr < 0
        echoerr "make.io does not exist."
        return
    endif
    execute "cbuffer " . l:cbufnr
    echomsg "closed " . a:handler
endfunction

The Interface

command! -nargs=+  MakeJob :call RunMake(<q-args>)

Show unsaved buffers

Simply enter :ls + to get a filtered view of unsaved buffers. The unfiltered output of the :ls command indicates those buffers with the plus sign.

View last messages

The g< command can be used to see the last page of previous command output.

How to remove ^M

In command mode you can use this substitute command :%s/<C-v><C-m>//. If you like to remove the annoying character from VimL script, use :%s/\r//e. The optional e flag suppresses error messages if no ^M is found. Therefor, I would recommend to use this flag from scripts.

Relative Line Numbers

To start using relative numbers, I recommend to put the following combination of settings into your vimrc:

set number set relativenumber

Together, they make Vim show the absolute number for the current line, and relative numbers for other lines.

Netrw

Netrw comes as a prepacked plugin in Vims standard installation. To start Netrw, type :Explore. The new Netrw buffer that will show up can be customized to match your needs. This may be a good start:

let g:netrw_use_errorwindow = 0
let g:netrw_liststyle = 1

Navigation is supported by the bookmark feature. Netrw stores bookmarks permanently in file .netrwbook, located in Vims home directory. To store a new bookmark press mb. To remove it, press mB. A preceding bookmark number is accepted. To find out the bookmark number for all bookmark, press qb. To go to a bookmark, press gb.

The list of bookmarks also displays the history marks. Those history marks are set when visiting a new directory. Use keys u and U to walk backward and forward in Netrws directory history.

To change the current directory :pwd to the actual display Netrw directory press key c.

Indent Code

Press == in visual or normal mode. Or Ctrl-f in insert mode.

How to switch between the actual and previous buffer

Press CTRL-^ or CTRL-6 to have a quick way to toggle between two files.

WORDS and words

Vim defines a WORD as a set of consecutive characters. The normal mode command dW will delete A/path/like/this assuming cursors positions is on the A character. Using normal mode command dw (cursors position is on A character) will delete only the A.

Grep, Grep Grep

It is very easy to configure any type of grep backend in Vim. This are the most common grep tools that is use in the past.

Ripgrep

set grepformat=%f:%l:%c:%m,%f:%l:%m
set grepprg=rg
        \ --vimgrep
        \ -t\ c
        \ -g\ !C_AUTOSAR
        \ -g\ !TLSim
        \ -g\ !TLProj
        \ -g\ !_sfprj

Grep (The Original)

set grepprg=grep\ -Hn\ -r\ --include='*.[ch]'
            \ --exclude-dir=TLProj
            \ --exclude-dir=TLSim
            \ --exclude-dir=Doc
            \ --exclude-dir=C_AUTOSAR

GNU Global

    set grepprg=global\ --result=grep\ --grep
    set grepformat=%f:%l:%m
    set cscopeprg=gtags-cscope

Windows findstr

if has("win32") || has("win64")
  set grepprg=findstr\ /N\ /F:.index
endif

HELP!

Open help file in the left window (if there is enough room)

autocmd BufEnter <buffer> if (winnr('$') == 2) && (&columns > 164) | wincmd H | endif