Vi and Vim text editors notes and examples

Intro

Configuration file :

Vim files configuration are located in two paths :

• Global one (for all users) inside /etc folder :

/etc/vimrc

• And on inside the personal folder :

~/.vimrc

or

/home/USER/.vimrc

We can for example put syntax on, in order to activate the color syntax.

Open a file

vim file

Open two, three or four files version and show the differences between them

vimdiff file1 file2 … 

Open files one above the other

vim -o file1 fichier2

Open files side by side

vim -O file1 fichier2

Open a file and go directly to line "x"

vim +"x" file1

Some Commands

Examples

• Delete end line blanck spaces :

:%s/\s\+$//g

• Replace the 12 end line next characters ($) by </br> :

:s/$/<\/br>/12

• Replace check_command check_kav1!serv01,4,5,6 by check_command check_kav1!serv01 1 3 5 /home/ from the line 10 to 50 and only if check_command is present :

:10,50g/check_command/s/\(.*\!\w*\).*/\1 1\ 3\ 5\ \/home\/

Explanations :

• 10,50 : work from line 10 to 50
• g/check_command : work only with lines containing check_command.
• s/\(.*\!\w*\).*/ : Part to replace. .*\! will match check_command check_kav1, \w* is equal to [a-zA-Z0-9] repeated once or more and will match serv01 each elements inside the bracket (aka check_command check_kav1) will be recorded inside the buffer \1.
• /\1 1\ 3\ 5\ \/home\/ : Part replaced. \1 buffer n°1 (aka check_command check_kav1). 1\ 3\ 5\ \/home\/ will give 1 3 5 /home/.

• Delete empty lines

:g/^$/d

• Delete every ip adress

:g/^\(\d\{,3}\.\d\{,3}\.\d\{,3}\.\d\{,3}\)//

• Replace <pre by <ul><pre or </pre by </ul></pre>

:s/<\(\/\=\)\(pre\)/<\1ul><\1\2/g

Explanations :

• \= : matches 0 or 1 more of the preceding characters

Others

Buffers

It's possible to put some text inside buffers which allow to keep inside memory some elements that we can use later. To do so, we will use following combination "+letter

• Example, to copy inside a buffer current line :

"ayy

• Then to paste :

"ap

Automatic line break each 72 characters

echo 'set textwidth=72' >> ~.vimrc

spell-checker

• Edit file .vimrc and add set spelllang=fr line

echo 'set spelllang=fr' >> ~/.vimrc

• Create spell folder inside ~/.vim or /usr/share/vim/vimcurrent/ for all system users, and we copy this files :

wget ftp://ftp.vim.org/pub/vim/runtime/spell/fr.latin1.spl
wget ftp://ftp.vim.org/pub/vim/runtime/spell/fr.latin1.sug
wget ftp://ftp.vim.org/pub/vim/runtime/spell/fr.utf-8.spl
wget ftp://ftp.vim.org/pub/vim/runtime/spell/fr.utf-8.sug

• We can enable the spell-checker :

:set spell

We will use z= on every red words to access to a correction list.

Unicode characters

From insertion mode we can generate unicode characters, example here with horizontal ellipsis «…»

• Enter in insert mode : i
• Press Ctrl+u to enter in unicode mode
• Type 2026 and press enter

References

• linuxfr.org
• http://www.tuteurs.ens.fr/