Vim Cheat Sheet

Get Help

:help - open the help docs. Ctrl+w - o to open help docs in full screen.

:helpgrep <term> - find help for a specific term. Use :cnext and :cprevious to cycle through matches.

Configurations

set cindent - Enable “C style” indenting. Example: when you type if (flag) { and hit enter, the next line will be indented. When you type the closing } of the block, unindenting will happen.

set shiftwidth=N - use N spaces for each step of indent when using cindent.

set tabstop=N - number of white spaces for a single tab.

set expandtab - replace tab character with spaces.

syntax on - enable syntax highlighting.

set splitbelow - open split pane below open pane

set splitright - open split pane to the right of open pane

To check for configured value, use ?, e.g. :set tabstop?.

View whitespace characters

Add to .vimrc:

set listchars=eol:$,tab:>·,trail:~,extends:>,precedes:<,space:·

Show the special characters using :set list and hide them using :set nolist

Indenting Commands

== - Correct indentation of the current line.

gg=G - Re-indent the entire file.

>> - Increase indentation of current line.

<< - Decrease indentation of the current line.

Searching

Repeat search

After searching, an empty search pattern will repeat the last search. This works with /, :s and :g.

Source: https://vim.fandom.com/wiki/Searching

Find a character x in the current line:

• f-x: find the next occurence of the character
• F-x: find the previous occurence of the character
• ;: repeat in direction of search
• ,: repeat in reverse direction of search

Search for a string in the register

After pressing / to enter a search string, you can then use Ctrl-R and then type the letter representing the register that you want to use.

Source: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/2312844/vim-yank-into-search-register

Change current working directory

In Vim: :cd

In NERDTree: Focus on node in NERDTree tab that needs to be set as cwd and type characters cd

NERDTree

Open selected node in a new tab: place cursor on the folder and press t.

Open file/folder menu: press m.

Buffers

• Open buffer in split
  • Horizontal split: :sb N
  • Vertical split: vert sb N
• Open a new file in split mode
  • Horizontal split: :sp filename
  • Vertical split: :vsp filename

Splits

• Move split to right - C-W L

Highlighting

• Highlight all occurences of word under cursor (*)
• Highlight all occurences of words that contain word under cursor (g*)
• Hide all highlights - :noh

Navigation

• Go to definition of method under cursor - gd
• Go to file under cursor - gf
• Open file under cursor in new split - C-W C-F
• Go back - C-O, Go forward - C-I

FZF

• Open file in horizontal split - C-x
• open file in vertical split - C-v

Inserting a character as it is

Problem: when pressing TAB, the tab character is automatically converted to spaces (because of expandtab)

Solution: Press Ctrl + V and then press TAB. Works in insert and command (: at bottom) mode.

Source: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/6951672/how-can-i-insert-a-real-tab-character-in-vim

Regular expressions with magic

Any Vim search pattern can include the special sequence \v (very magic), and this will make every following character except a-zA-Z0-9 and ‘_’ have special meaning. Using \V has the opposite effect: all characters have their literal meaning and must be preceded by \ to activate their special meaning.

Source: https://vim.fandom.com/wiki/Simplifying_regular_expressions_using_magic_and_no-magic