I've disabled the arrow keys on my .vimrc, but...
How do I navigate up and down in autocomplete pop-ups? j and k doesn't work as I am in the Insert mode.
You can use ctrl+n and ctrl+p (which are conveniently close to everything else). Incidentally, these also work in bash and other useful places, so are good to get used to.
You may also like other popupmenu commands: http://vimdoc.sourceforge.net/htmldoc/insert.html#popupmenu-keys
Related
Relatively new to VIM and having a great time using it.
One very minor annoyance I've been having is command mode character navigation when I want to revise a command. I'm used to using readline shortcuts on the regular (non-vim) command line but these shortcuts don't seem to work in : command mode.
For example, using ctrl + b to go back a character ends up sending me to the start of the line, or using alt + f to go forward a word ends up clearing the line and exiting command mode.
The only way I've found to navigate in command mode is to use the arrow keys, but I'm under the impression you should avoid the arrow keys in vim for max efficiency.
What is the standard way to navigate around in : command mode? Do vim users usually use the arrow keys here? Is there a different way to modify commands?
As a more concrete example, I've been using vimgrep a lot to search through files. I'll do a command like:
:vimgrep /font-family/j my-project/**/*.less | cope
Later, I'll want to use the same search but look for a different property, so I hit : then ctrl + p to access my previous vimgrep. Now here I have to use the arrow keys to navigate backwards to the search string and modify it. It would be much faster if I could use readline to navigate backwards by word then delete by word.
For small edits, Backspace and light use of the cursor keys should be fine. For anything larger, I would advise to use the command-line window:
In the command-line window the command line can be edited just like editing
text in any window.
So, there's no need to mentally switch to readline key mappings; just use the full editing power (including any custom mappings) of Vim!
You can switch via <C-F> from the command-line, or directly enter it (from normal mode) by pressing q: instead of :. All the details can be found at :help cmdline-window.
I like this question. Long time vim user, but new-ish here, so I can't vote it up. But indeed, perhaps unofficially, many vim fans feel that most of the time the goal is to not have your hands leave home row position (fingers move, hands relatively still).
I will admit, when it comes to command mode, I use the arrows. With P being on my pinky finger, I would miss-hit ctrl-P a lot, and it's faster to slide my right hand down (on my Natural keyboard) and find the up-arrow by quick feel, instantly, to do the same thing. Once I'm there, left-right arrows are also easy to find without looking or delay. Also Ctrl-arrows let you skip by word.
One of the great things about vim is the :help. I have easily spent tens of hours over the years reading through it, and it solves 95% of my problems if I have enough time and working-memory to push deep enough into it.
Here is what I found for :help readline:
READLINE readline.vim ft-readline-syntax
The readline library is primarily used by the BASH shell, which adds
quite a few commands and options to the ones already available. To
highlight these items as well you can add the following to your
|vimrc| or just type it in the command line before loading a file with
the readline syntax:
let readline_has_bash = 1
This will add highlighting for the commands that BASH (version 2.05a
and later, and part earlier) adds.
Give it a try! (I am using vim 7.4)
You can see a list of the default key binds with :help cmdline-history (scroll down a bit) and :help ex-edit-index.
You can remap this with cnoremap:
cnoremap <C-b> <Left>
cnoremap <C-a> <C-b>
" .. Probably more
Note that using cmap will probably get you into problems here since the right-hand side is the currently mapped action, whereas with cnoremap the right-hand side it will always use the native Vim action.
Using all of Vim, Xvim(for Xcode) and Ideavim(for IntelliJ), I'd like to be able to use the default keybindings while in insert mode rather than Vims. I've been using Xcode for quite some time now and have gotten quite good at typing with the standard Xcode bindings but Vim bindings are so much better while not in insert mode.
I know you can do .vimrc settings such as
:im <C-D> <esc>xa
to emulate these functions, but this still leaves problems with slightly different behaviors as well as losing functionality where these commands have multiple uses. IE ctrl+n is both down while typing and next while scrolling through autocompletions. Custom bindings in .vimrc removes the ability to scroll through autocompletions.
Using
:im <C-N> <NOP>
enables scrolling through autocompletions but still doesn't let it function as down.
Anybody know how to solve this?
If you really want to, you can put
nnoremap i :action VimPluginToggle<CR>
into your ~/.ideavimrc, then in Preferences => Keymap, find the Vim Emulator item and assign the shortcut ESC to it. This when instead of entering insert mode, you'll be disabling IdeaVim, and hitting ESC will re-enable it.
I tested this briefly and it does seem to work at least at a superficial level, although you lose the changing caret style as an indicator of which mode you're in. I'm not sure that's a good idea, however. Probably better to work within the system as designed and set up the bindings you want.
I am using JetBrains' phpstorm with the IdeaVim plugin.
I am wondering if I can bind keys in normal mode to editor actions.
For example, I used to have mapped Ctrl+B to Navigate > Declaration. Yet Ctrl+B is a vi motion to go one page backwards and that is ok.
I know I can configure a keyboard shortcut to a different one, e.g. Ctrl+Shift+B , yet to keep things simpler I want to have a key in ideavim's command mode mapped to that functionality, e.g. ;.
So that pressing ; in command mode would trigger the action of Declaration witin phpstorm.
How can I achieve this?
To give a specific answer for exactly what you asked to map: put this into your ~/.ideavimrc:
nnoremap ; :action VimGotoDeclaration<CR>
To find the action name, I typed :actionlist declaration which gives a subset of action names that include the word "declaration" in the action name.
As others have noted, you might also prefer to use one of the existing mappings rather than adding a new one.
what you wanted go to declaration is built in command in vim. You don't have to use IDEA's actions.
gd (goto declaration) is the thing you are looking for.
So you just press (normal mode) gd, to see what is gonna happen.
In a normal vim, do :h gd to check details.
You can use <C-]> (Ctrl+]) for following references (jumping to the declaration is an example of a reference) and <C-O> for going back. You can also map these Vim-style shortcuts using the map commands similar to the original Vim.
I'm using vim and im doing a lot of
:make
within vim. The only thing that is really annoying is that I have to press ENTER twice to jump back to the editor. I just want to go directly back if everything worked out fine. And I want to see the error once and press a key to jump directly to the error line.
Any ideas?
This is known as the hit-enter prompt:
If you accidentally hit or and you want to see the displayed
text then use |g<|. This only works when 'more' is set.
To reduce the number of hit-enter prompts:
Set 'cmdheight' to 2 or higher.
Add flags to 'shortmess'.
Reset 'showcmd' and/or 'ruler'.
Also, I'm sure you are aware of the quickfix window (:copen) to navigate errors/messages?
This can happen when the 'cmdheight' varible is < 2.
I had the same problem. This is a simple solution that seems to work:
map <F2> :silent make^M
Now I just hit the F2 key to compile and the annoying prompt is not so annoying.
Not sure if it would help you, but if you're on Windows you could try:
:set makeprg=start\ make
I think this will break the errorfile setting though.
See:
:help make
:help !start
Does anyone know how to change vim's default mode? Its default mode is command mode, but could I change it to insert mode?
Just add the following line to your vimrc:
start
Vim's default mode will be changed to Insert mode. Just press Esc to enter Command mode.
You can try the 'insertmode' option (add set insertmode to your .vimrc file), although I recommend that you learn the standard vi operation, because not all vi-like editors support this mode of work.
cheers,
mitch
If you really want an editor that starts out in insert mode, perhaps vim is not the editor for you.
Most editors that aren't based on vi behave the way you want. Emacs is very powerful, but it may be too complicated for your needs. Nano (man nano for info nano for more information) might be a good choice. There are other possibilities.
vim really isn't designed to be used that way. As others have said, there are ways to force it to start up in insert mode. (I've been using vi-style editors for decades, and I didn't even know about :set insertmode until now.) But it's awkward to use.
My advice: either (1) use an editor that behaves the way you want, or (2) spend some time learning to use vim in its default configuration, and see if you can get used to it.
One big advantage of vim's separation of insert and command modes is that the command mode can use letters as commands; modeless editors generally have to use control keys or function keys to execute commands.
Update (a decade later): vim has an option -y that starts it with insertmode enabled. evim is equivalent to vim -y, and eview to view -y. From the man page (emphasis added):
eVim starts Vim and sets options to make it behave like a modeless editor. This is still Vim but used as a point-and-click editor. This feels a lot like using Notepad on MS-Windows. eVim will always run in the GUI, to enable the use of menus and toolbar.
Only to be used for people who really can't work with Vim in the normal way. Editing will be much less efficient.
The 'insertmode' option is set to be able to type text directly.
Mappings are setup to make Copy and Paste work with the MS-Windows keys. CTRL-X cuts text, CTRL-C copies text and CTRL-V pastes text. Use CTRL-Q to obtain the original meaning of CTRL-V.
You can use
vi -cstartinsert
or
vi -cstart
That launch vi and put it insert mode. You can do an alias to that if it's really usefull (I still understand why you want that anyway). You can also look at this tip.
"Cream" is a project that aims to make Vim easier to use. By default everything you do in Cream is in insert mode, I believe:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cream_%28software%29