I am using spacemacs in GUI mode.
I was going through evil-tutor inside spacemacs. It told me to hit "j" to jump to next section. I was unable to do so since it was typing the letter "j" instead inside the buffer.
Similarly, I was unable to give commands such as ":qa! < ENTER >" and "x" to delete the character below the cursor. It just inserts the text.
help!
Related
The . key can be used to repeat the last insert command. However, we might do some navigation that is not part of the insert, but we want it repeated.
Imagine commenting out lines like so:
// line of text
// line of text
line of text
line of text
The insert command is to put the two forward slashes and a space. That can be repeated using the . key. The navigation would be to navigate down one line and then left some number of characters. That part is not captured by the . key command.
How can we achieve this functionality? I read that it was not available in Vi some years ago, but I'm wondering if it exists now in the latest version of Vim.
Press qX, where X is any of the writable registers (typically: pick any lowercase letter).
Do whatever actions you want to record.
Press q again to stop recording.
Press #X (where X is the same register) to play it back (count times, if used with a count).
Press ## to replay the most recently used macro (count times).
I read that it was not available in Vi some years ago, but I'm wondering if it exists now in the latest version of Vim.
If the Vim docs are to be believed, Vi did not support recording (steps 1-3), but did support #. Then you would have to manually yank the characters into the target register with "Xy<motion> or some other register-writing command. That also works under Vim, but I can't recommend it because it is much more error prone.
Another approach would be "block select then edit" approach:
ctrl + v - block select
then go down j or down-arrow
shift + i will put you in insert mode. Make the change here where you want it to be reflected on all the other lines you've selected.
esc twice will show/repeat that change you made on the line one.
If you have a big range of similar lines and want to put // at the beginning of it, you can do something like:
:15,25norm! I//<space>
You can also use visual area (vip selects an entire paragraph)
:'<,'>norm! I//<space>
using a pattern
:g/TODO/norm! I//<space>
I'm looking for a replacement for vim's "replace with character" command--specifically, I want to be able to select some text and replace each character with some character that I type (difficulty: No "vintage" mode)
Example:
Starting with
I am some text with an arbitrary number: 12358998281
I want an easy way to select 12358998281 and turn it into 99999999999, to make the result
I am some text with an arbitrary number: 99999999999
(in vim, this would be done by moving the cursor to the beginning of 12358998281, selecting with ve, then pressing r9)
I can do this by selecting the text, bringing up the "find" dialog, making sure "in selection" and "by regex" are enabled, searching for ., then typing my character into the resulting multiselect. This is incredibly laborious, however, and it prevents me from doing this process on a multiselect (for example, if 12358998281 exists in multiple parts of the file, I might want to quickly replace all instances of it with 99999999999, rather than performing the process above, getting the substitution, copying it to the clipboard, and then replacing with that).
Does Sublime have a command that acts like vim's "replace" that I can bind to something, or do I have to write a macro to get what I need? Or, am I approaching this from entirely the wrong direction?
A more generalized way of thinking of this is "how can I break a select into a multiselect on all characters", if that helps.
By using this package https://sublime.wbond.net/packages/RegReplace you can create regex patterns and bind them to shortcuts.
Also if there are multiple occurrences of one word, you can put cursor on whatever part of the word and press CTRL+D multiple times. One CTRL+D press will select the word under the cursor, every other press will select next occurrence of the word.
You could also use https://sublime.wbond.net/packages/Expand%20Selection%20to%20Whitespace to expand the selection to whitespace if your word contain some random characters, and then press CTDL+D to select next occurrences of the word.
Edit: With the package regex shortcuts indeed you have to create regexes before binding them. But the CTRL+D does work without it.
I don't see a problem with using "Expand selection to whitespace" and than doing the CTRL+D as I wrote in the answer.
I've checked the usage of visual as you wrote in the question and this solution seems much faster to do. You don't have to place cursor in the beggining of the word as It can be whereever in the word and no find/replace is needed, since you'll multiselect all occurrences by holding CTRL+D for a sec and You'll be free to edit it.
You can also use https://sublime.wbond.net/packages/Expand%20Selection%20to%20Quotes to select text inside quote and combine it with CTRL+D if standard CTRL+D doesn't work with some text, or if select to whitespace selects too much text.
I ended up solving this with a simple (if inelegant) plugin:
import sublime_plugin
import sublime
class MultiSelectWithinSelectedCommand(sublime_plugin.TextCommand):
def run(self, edit):
selection = self.view.sel()
new_regions = []
for selected_region in selection:
if selected_region.empty():
selection.add(self.view.word(selected_region))
for selected_region in selection:
if selected_region.a > selected_region.b:
region_begin = selected_region.b
else:
region_begin = selected_region.a
for pos in range(selected_region.size()):
subregion_begin = region_begin + pos
subregion_end = subregion_begin + 1
new_regions.append(sublime.Region(subregion_begin, subregion_end))
selection.clear()
selection.add_all(new_regions)
Once I've stuck this in my plugins directory, I would bind a command in the keymap file like usual:
{ "keys": ["alt+f"], "command": "multi_select_within_selected" }
(with alt+f chosen arbitrarily), and lo, multi-select on all selected characters with a keypress (after which, I can press my replacement character).
I noticed this accidentally when playing around in vimtutor. What's the difference between append and insert mode in Vim? When I type a in normal mode (not A) I can insert text. When should I use one and not the other?
The append command will put the cursor after the current position, while the insert command will put the cursor before it.
Using the append command is like moving the cursor one character to the right, and using the insert command.
Using the insert command is like moving the cursor one character to the left, and using the append command.
You choose which depending on where you want to start typing.
Note that vimtutor doesn't initially make the case of the command obvious:
SHIFT+A (capital A, as opposed to a) the cursor moves to the end of the current line.
SHIFT+I (capital I, as opposed to i)moves to the start of the current line.
Another important aspect on Append is that if the position after the current position is a empty space followed by a word. After you are done writing it will concatenate both words.
E.g. A file with the following text:
Hi there.
With the cursor on i. After pressing the a button and then ESC you would have:
Hithere.
I am trying to get off of using the arrow keys to navigate in VIM, so that I dont have to move my hands off the home rows. The problem I am having is finding the End Key equivalent. I used it a ton to go to the end of a line. I can still use it, but then I have to move my hands off the home rows, making this adjustment pointless. $ moves my cursor to the last character in the line, not after the last character in the line, which is where I want it to go. Why would I want to insert right before the last character on the line?
How can I remap the functionality of End Key (which can be used in insert and visual mode) to something else?
Thank you
It looks like you are doing $i which is the wrong approach.
$ is the right command to reach the end of the line but i is used to enter insert mode before the current character. You are supposed to use a to enter insert mode after the current character.
So you seem to be blocked because you don't know about a which is just as basic as i, IMO.
$a would solve your immediate problem.
But there's more, did you know that you can use I to enter insert mode at the beginning of the line? What command could we use to enter insert mode at the end of the line?
You are right, the correct command to enter insert mode at the end of the line is simply A, as #dusan commented.
You don't need to remap anything. What you need is a second (first?) injection of $ vimtutor.
I find Vim's undo to be a bit too coarse. E.g. if I type something like this:
a // to go into edit mode
to be or not to ve
<esc> // to exit insert mode
Oops! I made a typo. I want to start undoing so I press u, but then it clears the whole line. Is there a way to undo word-by-word or character-by-character?
You can break undos via :help i_ctrl-g_u. You can map this if you want for every character, but that might a little bit complicated. Mapping this to space button is a way.
:inoremap <Space> <Space><C-g>u
After that every word can be undo via u
So as you see from the others what you are asking for doesn't exist in Vi (AFAIK).
Undo undoes what your last action was. If your last action was to enter insert mode and then add a line and then exit insert mode. That will be undone, however if from the default mode you hit the "x" key then you will delete 1 character or if in visual mode with text selected the text will be deleted. If you hit undo then you will restore that one character or the text that was selected.
...You should think of this as an action, and actions can be atomically undone or restored
As mentioned previously if you wish to delete the previous word then you should be able to hit Ctrl + w and delete the previous word while remaining in insert mode.
If you exit insert mode you can navigate (motion) back a word with "b" forward a word with "w" to the end of a word with "e", and can cut (which leaves you in insert mode) with "c" or delete with "d". Both actions cut and delete can accept a motion following them so you can delete the current word / up to the next word with "dw" or cut the previous word with "cb"
This concept becomes more useful when you remember to use the "." command (in normal mode). This command is to repeat the last action. I have used this many times to find and replace a small group of words in a file (It is especially useful if you are paranoid about changing too much). The scenario would be the following:
File:
This is my post
really it is a test
this is the middle
This is the end
if I wanted to replace "is" with "was" I could write:
%s/\<is\>/was/g
however if I wanted to change the first line and the third line "is" to "was" (and I didn't know their line numbers, and I wanted to see if there were any other places I wanted to change is to was I could type
"/is"
hit "n" until I reach the place I want substituted, and then hit "cw" and type "was"
I can now hit "n" until I reach another place I want substituted and hit ".", and that will replace "is" with "was" (Note: my search string didn't limit to the word "is", just the two characters "is" so "This" & "this" will match in this case)
No, it is not possible and is actually not necessary either. Vim has a million ways of dealing with that. Try cb for example. Or bC. Or brb. Or Tspace to jump back instead of b. Or ciw.
You can, of course use most of these solutions in insert mode (by pressing CTRLo first), or bind one to your favorite key combination (:help map and :help imap).
On Linux, using control-w while in input mode deletes the last 'word'.