pages:cheatsheets:vi
Table of Contents
vi
Cursor movement
h - move left j - move down k - move up l - move right w - jump by start of words (punctuation considered words) W - jump by words (spaces separate words) e - jump to end of words (punctuation considered words) E - jump to end of words (no punctuation) b - jump backward by words (punctuation considered words) B - jump backward by words (no punctuation) 0 - (zero) start of line ^ - first non-blank character of line $ - end of line G - Go To command (prefix with number - 5G goes to line 5)
Prefix a cursor movement command with a number to repeat it. For example, 4j moves down 4 lines.
Insert Mode – Inserting/Appending text
i - start insert mode at cursor I - insert at the beginning of the line a - append after the cursor A - append at the end of the line o - open (append) blank line below current line (no need to press return) O - open blank line above current line ea - append at end of word Esc - exit insert mode
Editing
r - replace a single character (does not use insert mode) J - join line below to the current one cc - change (replace) an entire line cw - change (replace) to the end of word c$ - change (replace) to the end of line s - delete character at cursor and subsitute text S - delete line at cursor and substitute text (same as cc) xp - transpose two letters (delete and paste, technically) u - undo . - repeat last command
Marking text (visual mode)
v - start visual mode, mark lines, then do command (such as y-yank) V - start Linewise visual mode o - move to other end of marked area Ctrl+v - start visual block mode O - move to Other corner of block aw - mark a word ab - a () block (with braces) aB - a {} block (with brackets) ib - inner () block iB - inner {} block Esc - exit visual mode
Visual commands
> - shift right < - shift left y - yank (copy) marked text d - delete marked text ~ - switch case
Cut and Paste
yy - yank (copy) a line 2yy - yank 2 lines yw - yank word y$ - yank to end of line p - put (paste) the clipboard after cursor P - put (paste) before cursor dd - delete (cut) a line dw - delete (cut) the current word x - delete (cut) current character
Exiting
:w - write (save) the file, but don't exit :wq - write (save) and quit :q - quit (fails if anything has changed) :q! - quit and throw away changes
Search/Replace
/pattern - search for pattern ?pattern - search backward for pattern n - repeat search in same direction N - repeat search in opposite direction :%s/old/new/g - replace all old with new throughout file :%s/old/new/gc - replace all old with new throughout file with confirmations
Working with multiple files
:e filename - Edit a file in a new buffer :bnext (or :bn) - go to next buffer :bprev (of :bp) - go to previous buffer :bd - delete a buffer (close a file) :sp filename - Open a file in a new buffer and split window ctrl+ws - Split windows ctrl+ww - switch between windows ctrl+wq - Quit a window ctrl+wv - Split windows vertically
Line Numbers
:set number
pages/cheatsheets/vi.txt · Last modified: 2020/09/13 00:26 by Heiko Mischer