created 2006 · complexity basic · author Eric Arnold · version 5.7
I've decided to swap the ; and : keys since I use the : key much more often.
I also made a mapping so that ;; puts you directly into the command line edit window. My fingers always get into a knot when entering a lot of :ex commands and editing them often.
" nothing but '<C-V><C-F>' worked, including combinations of "\<C-F" " cnoremap ; <C-R>= getcmdpos() == 1 ? '<C-V><C-F>A' : ';' <CR> cnoremap <expr> ; (getcmdpos() == 1 && getcmdtype() =~ '\v^:') ? '<C-F>A' : ';' silent! nunmap ; silent! nunmap : nnoremap <unique> ; : nnoremap <unique> : ;
Comments
See 1111 Map semicolon to colon.
Ummm. Don't map ":" to anything, it's a bad idea!
I haven't figured out which key I want to use to replace ; I tried to set a mapping like:
noremap ff ;
but the problem was that for some reason, it would succeed in triggering the 'f' command always as 'f' as the target, but goes ahead and does a ";" command also.
Oops. The previous anon was mine. Anyway, comment out the map for ":".
It isn't quite right to have ";" put you info edit mode from search "/" . cmap governs all the different command window inputs. Hmm. Any ideas?
I really meant this:
cnoremap <expr> ; getcmdpos() == 1 ? '<C-F>kA' : ';' or cnoremap <expr> ; getcmdpos() == 1 ? '<C-F>k$' : ';'
so it puts you at the end of the previous command in the edit window.
I have basically the same settings, except that I didn't clobber the : command. Instead, I just mapped ;; to ; -- I use it rarely enough that it isn't a problem to hit it twice:
noremap ;; ; map ; : " edit command-line map q; q:
I chose to use map rather than nmap for the ; mapping to allow it to work in visual mode also, which is very useful.
Here is another version that works in Vim6. The <expr> thing was added with Vim7.
if v:version >= 700 cnoremap <expr> ; getcmdpos() == 1 ? '<C-F>k$' : ';' else cnoremap ; <C-R>=getcmdpos() == 1 ? '<C-V><C-F>k$' : ';'<CR> endif
I guess this idea is really for those that spend a lot of time in the command line. When I'm writing Vim script, I use the command line a zillion times a minute. The ;; map works, but the operator-pending wait, with maps of more than one char, gets annoying if you're using it every few seconds.
BTW, here's another map that's ergonomically fast for re-doing the previous command.
nmap <Leader>. :<C-P><CR>
> nmap <Leader>. :<C-P><CR>
Isn't it the same as @: ?
The delay with ;; only becomes apparent if you actually WAIT for the command-line to show up after you hit the first ;... I usually know what command I'm going to type so just type something like ;saveas or something, without actually waiting for the command-line. There's no delay because there is no ambiguity: the instant I hit the second key, the command-line appears with the key I had typed put in place.
I, too, use the command-line for everything. I wouldn't have put forth the ;; mapping if it actually caused a problem in everyday use.