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created June 29, 2001 · complexity basic · author Salman Halim · version 5.7


One of the things i do a lot in Vim is to make a change to the beginning or end of the line (such as adding the text '// remove' at the end of java debug code). a quick way of doing this is to use a to append the text to the end of the first line and then move down one, hit . (repeat last edit), move down, hit . etc. etc. the following mapping allows one to simply highlight the region in question and hit . -- it will automatically execute the . once on each line:

" allow the . to execute once for each line of a visual selection
vnoremap . :normal .<CR>

Another thing i do a lot is to record a quick macro in the "a" register and then play it back a number of times. while @@ can be used to repeat the last register used, my recorded macros sometimes use other registers so @@ doesn't necessarily give me the same results as @a. also, i have mapped ' to ` because i like to go to the precise location of my marks -- always -- and never to the beginning of the line. this leaves my ` key unused. so:

" make ` execute the contents of the a register
nnoremap ` @a

then, in keeping with the visual . above, i did the same for the ` -- is thexecutes @a once on each highlighed line.

vnoremap ` :normal @a<CR>

as an example, say i have the following lines of java code:

public String m_asdf;
public String m_lkhj;
public int m_hjkhjkh;

and, for some reason, i need to get the following:

 "asdf"
 "lkhj"
 "hjkhjkh"

I record the following into a:

^cf_"<Esc>$r"

the ^ is because my java code is indented and i don't want to go to column 0 and the <Esc> is an actual escape i hit to exit insert mode. then, i simply select (visually) the other lines (only two in case -- admittedly not an overly useful example) and just hit `.

Comments[]

i found that a few plugin scripts that i use regularly depended on ` having default functionality, so i switched the ` key to ~ for my use (i couldn't be bothered to change all the scripts to use noremap instead of just map).


as a side note, i have the following mapping in my vimrc:

noremap v ~

since i find the v easier to hit than the tilde anyway -- and i don't have any plugins that fiddle about with the case of my text so i don't break anything this way.


If action is just inserting at a given column, also see VimTip194


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