Yanking all marked lines in vim - vim

Question

Often times when reviewing log files in vim, I'll highlight interesting lines using marks. At some point, I'd like to be able to copy all of the interesting lines (either all marked lines, or a list of marks) to either a register or another file (it doesn't really matter which; the goal is to facilitate writing a summary). I haven't been able to find any built in way to do this; is it possible in vim?
I suppose it's probably a fairly straightforward function; probably looking something like this, but my vimscript abilities are very weak:
for cur_mark in list_of_marks
goto mark
yank current line and append to register
Has anyone ever written anything similar that they can point me to?
Thanks
EDIT: I posted the accepted solution at https://github.com/mikeage/vim-yankmarks

Answer 1

As always, there are few things that are more motivating than asking for help. Here's what I came up with; feedback welcome.
function! Yankmark()
let save_cursor = getpos(".")
let n = 0
" I should really make this a parameter...
let marks_to_yank="abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz"
let nummarks = strlen(marks_to_yank)
" Clear the a register
let #a=''
while n < nummarks
let c = strpart(marks_to_yank, n, 1)
" Is the mark defined
if getpos("'".c)[2] != 0
" using g' instead of ' doesn't mess with the jumplist
exec "normal g'".c
normal "Ayy
endif
let n = n + 1
endwhile
call setpos('.', save_cursor)
endfunction

Answer 2

Mikeage had a great idea; here's a more refined version of his function turned into a command:
":YankMarks [{marks}] [{register}]
" Yank all marked (with [a-z] / {marks} marks) lines into
" the default register / {register} (in the order of the
" marks).
function! s:YankMarks( ... )
let l:marks = 'abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz'
let l:register = '"'
if a:0 > 2
echohl ErrorMsg
echomsg 'Too many arguments'
echohl None
return
elseif a:0 == 2
let l:marks = a:1
let l:register = a:2
elseif a:0 == 1
if len(a:1) == 1
let l:register = a:1
else
let l:marks = a:1
endif
endif
let l:lines = ''
let l:yankedMarks = ''
for l:mark in split(l:marks, '\zs')
let l:lnum = line("'" . l:mark)
if l:lnum > 0
let l:yankedMarks .= l:mark
let l:lines .= getline(l:lnum) . "\n"
endif
endfor
call setreg(l:register, l:lines, 'V')
echomsg printf('Yanked %d line%s from mark%s %s',
\ len(l:yankedMarks),
\ len(l:yankedMarks) == 1 ? '' : 's',
\ len(l:yankedMarks) == 1 ? '' : 's',
\ l:yankedMarks
\) . (l:register ==# '"' ? '' : ' into register ' . l:register)
endfunction
command! -bar -nargs=* YankMarks call <SID>YankMarks(<f-args>)

Answer 3

A different way of accomplishing this might be using the :global command. The global command takes the form :g/{pattern}/{cmd}. The command, {cmd}, will be executed on all lines matching {pattern}.
Append lines matching a pattern to a register:
:g/pattern/yank A
Append matching line to a log file:
:g/pattern/w >> file.log
Of course if you want to find line matching a mark you can match it in your pattern. The following pattern matches a line with mark m.
:g/\%'m/w >> file.log
To do something like this. (Note: I am using \v to turn on very magic)
:g/\v(%'a|%'b|%'m)/yank A
Of course if a pattern won't work you can do this by hand. Instead of marking the lines just build up the lines as you go. Just yank a line to an uppercase register to append.
"Ayy
Or do a write append with a range of a single line
:.w >> file.log
For more help see
:h :g
:h :w_a
:h /\%'m
:h /\v

Answer 4

You can do something like:
:redir #a
:silent marks XYZN
:redir END
"ap
That way the output of the :marks command will be redirected to the a register. Note, that it will only lists (in the above case) the X, Y, Z and N marks (as the arguments), and if there was an a register, it will be deleted/overwritten.
Also note, that it might not give the desired output, but gives you a starting point...

Answer 5

I like the solution from Mikeage, though I would probably solve this with the multiselect - Create multiple selections and operate plugin. This also has the benefit that you don't run out of marks.
With the plugin, you can select lines with <Leader>msa or :MSAdd. Finally, yank all lines with:
:let #a=''
:MSExecCmd yank A

Answer 6

If you use an upper-case register name when yanking into a specific register, Vim will append the yanked content instead of overwriting the register's value.
So, for example:
"ayy - yank current line to register a, overwriting
[move]
"Ayy - append this line to register a
[move]
"ap - paste all yanked material
See :help quotea for more details.