playing_with_vi.md

Vi text editor commands examples

• set up the .vimrc file rc files

• :setlocal spell to get highlighted spell check. Choose from offered correction by typing z= at the misspelled word.

• :g/^/m0 to reverse the content of a file, for example lines 1-2-3 to 3-2-1

• simple find and replace anything in whole file :%s/something/new/g

• remove all white space (unknown amount) :%s/[^ ]\zs \+/ /g where \zs means the required result starts after the [^ ] (lines that start with a whitespace)

• replace occurance of a character in selected lines and selected number of occurances in a line

  :g/^/let i=0 | where i<1 | s/a/b/ | let i+=1 | endwhile - first occurances of a is replaced by b in all lines (g) :3,5/^/let i=0 | while i<1 | s/b/c/ | let i+=1 | endwhile

   a a b a b
   a a b a b
   a a c a b
   a a c a b
   a a b a b
   a a b a b
   a a b a b

• block comment/uncomment Ctrl + v to select line and add/remove character(s) #

References:

• http://thecodeship.com/tools/year-of-vim-beginner-advice-lessons-learned/