Add a newline after given patterns

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Tip: #671 - Add a newline after given patterns

Created: March 5, 2004 23:58 Complexity: basic Author: parv Version: 6.0 Karma: 4/1 Imported from: Tip#671

After having gone numb when trying to de parse HTML source code with very long lines, I created the following function, thus macro and command. It takes a list of one or more patterns/strings, and adds a newline after each. (Wrapping/Indentation is controlled by your own settings).

"Intentionally left incomplete to be complete as needed
nnoremap ,nl :NewLine

"Add line breaks in after given strings/regex
com! -nargs=+ -range -bar NewLine <line1>,<line2>call AddNewLine(<f-args>)

function! AddNewLine(...) range
let str_no = 1

while str_no <= a:0
    exec 'let var = a:' . str_no

    " ` (backquote) is used as delimiters for s///, which is hard
    "  to distinguish but also is much rarer than delimiters.
    "
    "  And, "No Match found" messages are suppressed (s///e)
    "
    "  (The "exec..." is one long line.)
    exec a:firstline . "," . a:lastline . 's`\(' . var . '\)\($\)\@!`\1\r`ge'

    let str_no = str_no +1
endwhile

unlet! var
unlet str_no
endfunction 

Note: The substitution is done on a pattern which is NOT ALREADY AT THE END of the line. The default range is limited to current line; specify other range just like any other Vim command.

Comments

Why not just use the 's'ubstitution command and ^V^M (ctrl-v, ctrl-m) (or ^Q^M)?

To put a new line after each <br /> tag in your html try something like:

:%s/<br \/>/<br \/>^V^M/g

andy47--AT--halfcooked.com , March 6, 2004 2:51

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To Andy47,

I wrote the function mainly because to get the effect of giving OR'd pattern, in LHS of s///, simply separated by spaces w/o having to escape the darned "|"; also, to not having to remember to put "\($\)\--AT--!" -- zero width negative look ahead assertion for end-of-line -- on each invocation of s///. \--AT--! is used to limit the number of useless blank lines.

As to using ^V^M, instead of \r I suppose, ... I tried using \<CR> , <CR> , ^V^M and ^M in a normal macro, which was not including a new line. (I had not tried ^Q^M.) Instead, search for 'g' was being initiated, given macro's RHS was ":%s/\(>\)\($\)\--AT--!/\1^M/g" (where ^M is one of \<CR> , <CR> , ^V^M, ^M).

The same exact macro works as desired when manually executed. After wasting time w/ above four character sequences, I used \r.

parv , March 6, 2004 12:33

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