2.7 KiB
2.7 KiB
Intro to Vim
Intro to Vim
Why I use Vim
- Was using too many tools
- Sublime Text 2 for editing
- Putty for SSH
- git bash for git
- Cygwin for Rubt commands
- Can mostly be done in ST2, but with time invested. Restart with Vim
- "nerd cred"
- More importantly, server administration
- Vim (or vi) works everywhere, no matter how broken the machine is
- (emacs does not)
- After 20 years, people are still finding new ways to use it
- Repetitive Strain injury - vim helps enforce better habbits
- You have to decide what works for you
Everyone's first Vim session
- Bash.org joke
But how can we avoid this
- vimtutor - 30-45 minutes is enough to gain usability
- VIM Adventures - game that finally pushed me into learning
- Cheat Sheet - I still keep one printed off on a wall
- Focus on a small set - I picked five that I wrote down and learned each week
- and still do from time to time
You will still struggle
- Some of the things I struggled with
- Copy and paste - very different idea, more later (and more advanced)
- Not using a mouse - if you don't plan on this, Vim is not for you
- Getting to the end of the line example
- I used shift+A instead of $ for months
Vim has modes
- In the early days, all editors had modes. By programmers, for programers.
- Mid-1970s, Larry Tesler came up with the concept of modeless editors.
- But a lot of power in favor of this ease of use.
You can move around
- Focus on home row. h, l to go left and right, j, k to go up and down
- Arrow keys are bad. Require awkward hand movements.
- Variants can get you around the screen faster.
- Screen: H, M, L
- Document: gg, G, :50
And do things
- insert is a complete mode switch to let you type text, leave with
- delete, change, yank act on things
- All of them put affected text into a place that can be pasted from
On objects
- Everything is an object in Vim.
- Learning to utilize these is the key to effective vim use
That can be modified
- inside - excludes the surrounding part of the object
- around - includes the surrounding part of the object
- till - from cursor to the specific character
- find - the same as till except for including the specific character
And finally combined into a language
- das - includes the spaces. dis would not include the space after
Demonstration
Other Talks
- Ben Orenstein - one of my favorite speakers. more intermediate than beginner
- Note comment on saving keystrokes
- Damian Conway - More advanced and neat plugins
- Chris Hunt - Shows basics of using Vim in combination with Tmux
- I do this
Resources
- Slides along with sample configuration available on Github