Let's say you're browsing this page and you see the following snippet of code:
_trackEvent(category, action, opt_label, opt_value, opt_noninteraction)
You double-click to select the whole line, copy it and then want to insert it between the double quotes here in Vim:
<div onClick=""></div>
Well, instead of this:
<div onClick="_trackEvent(category, action, opt_label, opt_value, opt_noninteraction)"></div>
This is what I get when I do it:
_trackEvent(category, action, opt_label, opt_value, opt_noninteraction)
<div onClick=""></div>
And it's pretty annoying. It's due to the ending line break that's inserted by OS X in the clipboard. How could I tell Vim to ignore the ending line breaks when working with one liners?
Because you've copied an entire line (with a trailing newline), Vim uses linewise paste, i.e. the text isn't inserted at the cursor position, but in a separate line above / below the current one. With <C-R>* from insert mode, you can avoid that, but it will still insert the trailing newline.
My UnconditionalPaste plugin has a gcp mapping that pastes the register always in characterwise mode. (And several related mappings for other modes and special pastes.) With it, you just position the cursor on the first / second " and do "*gcp / "*gcP.
Related
I want to wrap some code :
myObj.text;
with a function call where the code is passed as an argument.
console.log(myObj.text);
I've thought about using surround.vim to do that but didn't manage to do it.
Any idea if it's possible ? I
With Surround in normal mode:
ysiwfconsole.log<CR>
With Surround in visual mode:
Sfconsole.log<CR>
Without Surround in normal mode:
ciwconsole.log(<C-r>")<Esc>
Without Surround in visual mode:
cconsole.log(<C-r>")<Esc>
But that's not very scalable. A mapping would certainly be more useful since you will almost certainly need to do it often:
xnoremap <key> cconsole.log(<C-r>")<Esc>
nnoremap <key> ciwconsole.log(<C-r>")<Esc>
which brings us back to Surround, which already does that—and more—very elegantly.
I know and use two different ways to accomplish this:
Variant 1:
Select the text you want to wrap in visual mode (hit v followed by whatever movements are appropriate).
Replace that text by hitting c, then type your function call console.log(). (The old text is not gone, it's just moved into a register, from where it will be promptly retrieved in step 3.) Hit <esc> while you are behind the closing parenthese, that should leave you on the ) character.
Paste the replaced text into the parentheses by hitting P (this inserts before the character you are currently on, so right between the ( and the )).
The entire sequence is v<movement>c<functionName>()<esc>P.
Variant 2:
Alternatively to leaving insert mode and pasting from normal mode, you can just as well paste directly from insertion mode by hitting <ctrl>R followed by ".
The entire sequence is v<movement>c<functionName>(<ctrl>R")<esc>.
You can use substitution instruction combined with visual mode
To change bar to foo(bar):
press v and select text you want (plus one more character) to surround with function call (^v$ will select whole text on current line including the newline character at the end)
type :s/\%V.*\%V/foo\(&\)/<CR>
Explanation:
s/a/b/g means 'substitute first match of a with b on current line'
\%V.*\%V matches visual selection without last character
& means 'matched text' (bar in this case)
foo\(&\) gives 'matched text surrounded with foo(...) '
<CR> means 'press enter'
Notes
For this to work you have to visually select also next character after bar (^v$ selects also the newline character at the end, so it's fine)
might be some problems with multiline selections, haven't checked it yet
when I press : in visual mode, it puts '<,'> in command line, but that doesn't interfere with rest of the command (it even prevents substitution, when selected text appears also somewhere earlier on current line) - :'<,'>s/... still works
In VIM's replace mode, as you type, you don't add any new content, you just replace what is already there. Only problem is that you can add new content when you press enter. I'd like to know if there is a way so that pressing enter (or ^M) will be interpreted as down arrow when you're in replace mode?
If you must know, I'm working in a file that has segments that are given a fixed number of lines. I can't add new lines because it will offset subsequent segments.
Thanks in advance!
As far as I understand your requirements this can be achieved in the virtual replace mode. You can enter it via gR.
Typing a <NL> still doesn't cause characters later in the file to appear to
move. The rest of the current line will be replaced by the <NL> (that is,
they are deleted), and replacing continues on the next line. A new line is
NOT inserted unless you go past the end of the file.
Please note that vim has to be compiled with +vreplace.
In Vim, let's say I want to replace the contents of one String with the content of another.
Original input
var1 = "January"
var2 = "February"
Desired output
var1 = "January"
var2 = "January"
What I would usually do is:
Move cursor to line 1
y i " (yank inner quotes)
Move cursor to the destination quote in line 2
v i " p (visual select inner quotes, paste)
While this works well, I generally try to avoid visual mode when possible, so I am not completely satisfied with my step 4 (v i " p).
Is there any way to specify a "destination paste area" without using Visual mode? I suspect it might be something chained to g, but I can't think of anything.
There are many ways of doing this however using visual mode is the easiest.
Use the black hole register to delete the content then paste. e.g. "_di"P
Do ci"<c-r>0. <c-r> inserts the contents of a register
Simply paste and then move over a character and delete the old text. e.g pldt"
However visual mode still has my vote. I find that the concerns most people have is that using visual mode + paste is that the default register is swap with the selected text and it doesn't repeat well. Good news everybody! The 0 register always stores the last yank. The bad news is visual mode still doesn't repeat well. Take a look at this vimcast episode, Pasting from Visual mode, for more information. It mentions a few plugin that help with this.
I need this so often, I wrote a plugin to simplify and allow maximum speed: ReplaceWithRegister.
This plugin offers a two-in-one gr command that replaces text covered by a {motion} / text object, entire line(s) or the current selection with the contents of a register; the old text is deleted into the black-hole register, i.e. it's gone. It transparently handles many corner cases and allows for a quick repeat via the standard . command. Should you not like it, its page has links to alternatives.
It's not particularly pretty, but here goes:
Go to line one and yi"
Move to line two
Type "_di"hp
That deletes what's in the quotes, but sends the deleted text to a black hole register. Then it moves the cursor back one, and pastes what you yanked from line one.
All in all, you can start on the first line and type yi"j"_di"hp. Why is it that people find vim intimidating? ;)
Alternatively, yank the first line as normal, then drop to line two and type ci"<Ctrl+p> and select the previously yanked text from the menu.
Excerpt from my .vimrc:
" Delete to 'black hole' register
nnoremap <leader>d "_d
vnoremap <leader>d "_d
So, you just need to \di"P as your last step (assuming you use \ as a <leader>).
There is a plugin that addresses this problem precisely. It was presumably born out of the same feeling you're feeling, namely that Visual mode often feels less than ideal to advanced Vim users.
operator-replace – Operator to replace text with register content
With operator-replace installed the replacing goes like this.
Yank the word inside the quotes.
yi"
Move to the target line
j
Replace inside the quotes with the yanked text. (I've set up gr as the replace operator: :map gr <Plug>(operator-replace). Pick your own mapping.)
gri"
Check it out! This is part of the truly excellent textobj/operator frameworks. I couldn't work without them.
To insert text from a file in the current Vim buffer I use :r filename to insert the text below the cursor or :0r filename to insert in the first line.
How do you insert the contents of a file where [Cursor] is located?
Actual line with some coding [Cursor] // TODO for later version
Line below actual line ...
This inserts the contents of the file whose path is at the cursor position:
:r <cfile>
Insert a line break, read the file, and then take out the line break...
I propose Ctrl-R Ctrl-O = join(readfile('filename','b'), "\n")
Other solution:
Possibly open the other file in another window, use :%yh (h is a register name) and in your original file, in normal mode use "hp or "hP or in insert mode, Ctrl-R Ctrl-O h
To expand on the accepted answer with actual code, since I tried the suggestion and it worked nicely;
Here is an example of it working to insert a little php snippet:
`nnoremap <leader>php a<CR><ESC>:.-1read $SNIPPETS/php<CR>I<BS><ESC>j0i<BS><ESC>l`
In general the syntax is
`nnoremap [KEY SEQUENCE] a<CR><ESC>:.-1read [FILE PATH]<CR>I<BS><ESC>j0i<BS><ESC>l`
Just to break it down:
nnoremap : I'm about to define a new key mapping for normal mode
<leader>php : I would like to trigger the command sequence when this key combination is pressed. In my case <leader> is , so I type ,php to trigger the command.
Now for the command, bit by bit:
a<CR><ESC> : go into insert mode (after the cursor), insert a line break, go back into normal mode.
:.-1read <file><CR> : this enters the desired file on the line above the current line.
I<BS><ESC> : jump to the start of the line, delete line break, return to normal mode.
j0i<BS><ESC>l : Go down one line (to the remainder of the line that you were initially on), jump to the start, enter insert mode, delete the line break, return to normal mode.
l : position the cursor to the right of the pasted file (this just made the command work more like how you expect it to).
note
You have a choice of whether to paste before or after the cursor. I have chosen in this example to paste after the cursor because that is how the p command usually works to paste yanked text. Alternately, to paste before the cursor you should change the a at the start of the command to an i. You could use one of these exclusively, or you could bind them both to different but related key sequences. For example:
`nnoremap <leader>php i<CR><ESC>:.-1read $SNIPPETS/php<CR>I<BS><ESC>j0i<BS><ESC>l`
Could paste text before the cursor,
and :
`nnoremap <leader><leader>php a<CR><ESC>:.-1read $SNIPPETS/php<CR>I<BS><ESC>j0i<BS><ESC>l`
could paste text after the cursor. Or vice versa. I have made 'before the cursor' easier to trigger because I use it more often when pasting in-line.
other note
This solution is mainly useful if you're reading from a file that you expect to use often enough that it's worthwhile setting up a key mapping for it (ie reading a snippet from a file). This doesn't really help if you just want to read in a random files whenever since you won't have the key mapping ready.
Since it is very formulaic, I'm sure it would be possible to define a function that would take the file name as an argument and do the same thing though. I've never written a function in vimscript though so if someone who knows more feels like editing this answer to contain that solution - I urge them to do so!
" put this in your ~/.vimrc
" in insert mode press ,n
"
imap ,n <c-r>=expand("%:p")<cr>
Read more in wikia.
Selecting a large amount of text that extends over many screens in an IDE like Eclipse is fairly easy since you can use the mouse, but what is the best way to e.g. select and delete multiscreen blocks of text or write e.g. three large methods out to another file and then delete them for testing purposes in Vim when using it via putty/ssh where you cannot use the mouse?
I can easily yank-to-the-end-of-line or yank-to-the-end-of-code-block but if the text extends over many screens, or has lots of blank lines in it, I feel like my hands are tied in Vim. Any solutions?
And a related question: is there a way to somehow select 40 lines, and then comment them all out (with "#" or "//"), as is common in most IDEs?
Well, first of all, you can set vim to work with the mouse, which would allow you to select text just like you would in Eclipse.
You can also use the Visual selection - v, by default. Once selected, you can yank, cut, etc.
As far as commenting out the block, I usually select it with VISUAL, then do
:'<,'>s/^/# /
Replacing the beginning of each line with a #. (The '< and '> markers are the beginning and and of the visual selection.
Use markers.
Go to the top of the text block you want to delete and enter
ma
anywhere on that line. No need for the colon.
Then go to the end of the block and enter the following:
:'a,.d
Entering ma has set marker a for the character under the cursor.
The command you have entered after moving to the bottom of the text block says "from the line containing the character described by marker a ('a) to the current line (.) delete."
This sort of thing can be used for other things as well.
:'a,.ya b - yank from 'a to current line and put in buffer 'b'
:'a,.ya B - yank from 'a to current line and append to buffer 'b'
:'a,.s/^/#/ - from 'a to current line, substitute '#' for line begin
(i.e. comment out in Perl)
:'s,.s#^#//# - from 'a to current line, substitute '//' for line begin
(i.e. comment out in C++)
N.B. 'a (apostrophe-a) refers to the line containing the character marked by a. ``a(backtick-a) refers to the character marked bya`.
To insert comments select the beginning characters of the lines using CTRL-v (blockwise-visual, not 'v' character wise-visual or 'V' linewise-visual). Then go to insert-mode using 'I', enter your comment-character(s) on the first line (for example '#') and finally escape to normal mode using 'Esc'. Voila!
To remove the comments use blockwise-visual to select the comments and just delete them using 'x'.
Use the visual block command v (or V for whole lines and C-V for rectangular blocks). While in visual block mode, you can use any motion commands including search; I use } frequently to skip to the next blank line. Once the block is marked, you can :w it to a file, delete, yank, or whatever. If you execute a command and the visual block goes away, re-select the same block with gv. See :help visual-change for more.
I think there are language-specific scripts that come with vim that do things like comment out blocks of code in a way that fits your language of choice.
Press V (uppercase V) and then press 40j to select 40 lines and then press d to delete them. Or as #zigdon replied, you can comment them out.
The visual mode is the solution for your main problem. As to commenting out sections of code, there are many plugins for that on vim.org, I am using tComment.vim at the moment.
There is also a neat way to comment out a block without a plugin. Lets say you work in python and # is the comment character. Make a visual block selection of the column you want the hash sign to be in, and type I#ESCAPE. To enter a visual block mode press C-q on windows or C-v on linux.
My block comment technique:
Ctrl+V to start blockwise visual mode.
Make your selection.
With the selection still active, Shift+I. This put you into column insert mode.
Type you comment characters '#' or '//' or whatever.
ESC.
Or you may want to give this script a try...
http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=23
For commenting out lines, I would suggest one of these plugins:
EnhancedCommentify
NERD Commenter
I find myself using NERD more these days, but I've used EnhancedCommentify for years.
If you want to perform an action on a range of lines, and you know the line numbers, you can put the range on the command line. For instance, to delete lines 20 through 200 you can do:
:20,200d
To move lines 20 through 200 to where line 300 is you can use:
:20,200m300
And so on.
Use Shift+V to go in visual mode, then you can select lines and delete / change them.
My usual method for commenting out 40 lines would be to put the cursor on the first line and enter the command:
:.,+40s/^/# /
(For here thru 40 lines forward, substitute start-of-line with hash, space)
Seems a bit longer than some other methods suggested, but I like to do things with the keyboard instead of the mouse.
First answer is currently not quite right?
To comment out selection press ':' and type command
:'<,'>s/^/# /g
('<, '> - will be there automatically)
You should be aware of the normal mode command [count]CTRL-D.
It optionally changes the 'scroll' option from 10 to [count], and then scrolls down that many lines. Pressing CTRL-D again will scroll down that same lines again.
So try entering
V "visual line selection mode
30 "optionally set scroll value to 30
CTRL-D "jump down a screen, repeated as necessary
y " yank your selection
CTRL-U works the same way but scrolls up.
v enters visual block mode, where you can select as if with shift in most common editors, later you can do anything you can normally do with normal commands (substitution :'<,'>s/^/#/ to prepend with a comment, for instance) where '<,'> means the selected visual block instead of all the text.
marks would be the simplest mb where u want to begin and me where u want to end once this is done you can do pretty much anything you want
:'b,'ed
deletes from marker b to marker e
commenting out 40 lines you can do in the visual mode
V40j:s/^/#/
will comment out 40 lines from where u start the sequence