Indentation in Vim

If you are a programmer, you always find doing indentations hard with
GUI based editors. But you can do indentations of line(s), block, or whole file,
with Vim with much ease and speed.

1. Indentation of a line.
a. Go to the line you want to indent.
b. Press ESc,
c. Press >>, to indent right, or
d. Press <<, to indent left

2. Indentation of n(say 5) lines.
a. Go to the first line of lines you want to indent.
b. Press ESc,
c. Press 5>>, to indent right, or
d. Press 5<<, to indent left


3. Indentation of a code block (Lines between { and }).
a. Go to the beginning '{' or end '}' of block.
b. Press ESc,
c. Press =%, to indent.


4. Indentation of whole program file.
a. Press ESc,
b. Go to the beginning of file by pressing 1G.
c. Press =G, to indent whole file.


I hope that now you can say that Vim is very easy and fast
as compared to other GUI editors. :) Happy VIMming.

Finding Matching Parenthesis in Your Source Code

Let us consider a simple C program.

1 #include
2
3 int main(int argc, char *argv[])
4 {
5 printf("Hello World.\n");
6 return (0);
7 }


In order to find matching parenthesis for parenthesis at line number 4.
Just press % in ESc mode.

You can use same command (%) to match (, ), [, ], {, or } .

Run Commands From Vim

Hello, you can run shell commands from Vim editor.

Press Esc : to go to command mode.

Type ! (Exclamation sign)

Type any command after !, and press ENTER

For example:

:!date

Wed May 21 12:44:33 IST 2008

Press ENTER or type command to continue

Searching Current Word

In order to search current word (word under cursor),

forward direction:

Esc *

reverse direction:

Esc #

Now, press either n or N to go in same direction or opposite direction.

This tip will prevent you from pressing many keys.
No need to go to search and press n/N. :)

Deleted Contents in Numbered[1-9] Buffers

If you have deleted some content (line(s) or word(s)) accidentally,
you can retrieve using Paste command (p or P).

For example,

In order to retrieve second latest deleted content:
Press Esc
Press "2p

Changing a Part of Word

All of us know cw (change word) command, to change a word.
It changes word from cursor to end of word. Suppose you want
to change a part of word.

for example: Mismanagement to Management

(i). Suppose your cursor is at M of Mismanagement, like
Mismanagement

(ii). Since you want to change only 4 characters "Mism" to "M",
Press c4l (Remembrall: Change 4 Left)
Then press M as replacement word. You will get
Management

Note

Search and Replace on VIM

1. Search and Replace All (Easiest)

Esc
:%s/old_pattern/new_pattern/g

2. Search and Replace selected

(a) Esc
(b) /old_pattern
(c) Go to desired by pressing n again and again
(d) Press cw (Change Word) and type
(e) Esc
(f) Press n to go to next old_pattern
(g) Press . if you want to do repeat last command used in step (c)
(h) Go to step (f), until all desired changes are made