Vim CheatSheet

Table of contents

Context

This is a collection of useful commands and keyboard shortcuts for using vim. Most should work with vanilla vim. Will label if any plugin is needed.

Tips

• jump to corresponding bracket or parenthesis, parenthesis: use % key
• copy to system clipboard: type “*y or “+y, see this stackoverflow question, can use pbcopy on mac

commenting multiple lines

How to comment multiple lines? Method below can achieve single line comment style, e.g., // in Java.

comment: Esc, ctrl+v (visual block mode), select multiple lines, shift+i, insert text, Esc uncomment: select (double click), ctrl+v, up down select multiple lines, delete see this stackoverflow question

Alternatively, you can use the record and repeat method below.

delete

How to delete word by word?

10dw # delete 10 words after the cursor

fix ^M windows line return

:e ++ff=dos
:set ff=unix

jump to where you want

How to quickly jump to where you want in vim?

10gg # jump to line 10
G # jump to file end
10w # jump forward 10 words
10b # jump backwards 10 words
alt(mac)/ctrl(windows) + left/right arrow # jump by word in insert mode or other editors such as Notepad or TextEdit
f<letter> # jump to the first letter of the word you would like to jump to

record and repeat

Esc q followed by a: start recording and store in register a q to stop recording 98@a to repeat the recording 98 times

search replace

:%s/foo/bar/g  # replace all
:6,10s/foo/bar/g  # replace in lines [6,10] inclusive

See this stackoverflow question

:s/<search_string>/<replace_string>/c # step through and ask for confirmation to replace on this line
:6,10s/foo/bar/g # replace in lines 6-10 inclusive
:%s/foo/bar/g # replace all