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Tip 112 Previous Tip • Next Tip

Created: September 11, 2001 Complexity: intermediate Author: Thore Karlsen Minimum version: 5.7 Karma: 34/15 Imported from: Tip#112

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An earlier tip explained how to jump back and forth between lines with the same indentation level. I do this a lot, so I came up with this slightly more comprehensive solution.

The example mappings below work as follows:

• [l and ]l jump to the previous or the next line with the same indentation level as the one you're currently on.
• [L and ]L jump to the previous or the next line with an indentation level lower than the line you're currently on.

These movements also work in visual mode and (only as of one of the 6.0 alpha versions) in operator pending mode, meaning that you can do a d]l. The motion is specified as being exclusive when in operator pending mode.

When might you use this? If you're writing programs in Python, Haskell, or editing XML files, they will be very useful. E.g. in XML you can jump to the outer enclosing tag, or the next matching tag. I use it for practically anything I edit, so it's not limited to this.

"
" NextIndent()
"
" Jump to the next or previous line that has the same level or a lower
" level of indentation than the current line.
"
" exclusive (bool): true: Motion is exclusive
" false: Motion is inclusive
" fwd (bool): true: Go to next line
" false: Go to previous line
" lowerlevel (bool): true: Go to line with lower indentation level
" false: Go to line with the same indentation level
" skipblanks (bool): true: Skip blank lines
" false: Don't skip blank lines
function! NextIndent(exclusive, fwd, lowerlevel, skipblanks)
 let line = line('.')
 let column = col('.')
 let lastline = line('$')
 let indent = indent(line)
 let stepvalue = a:fwd ? 1 : -1
 while (line > 0 && line <= lastline)
   let line = line + stepvalue
   if ( ! a:lowerlevel && indent(line) == indent ||
     \ a:lowerlevel && indent(line) < indent)
     if (! a:skipblanks || strlen(getline(line)) > 0)
       if (a:exclusive)
         let line = line - stepvalue
       endif
       exe line
       exe "normal " column . "|"
       return
     endif
   endif
 endwhile
endfunc

" Moving back and forth between lines of same or lower indentation.
nnoremap <silent> [l :call NextIndent(0, 0, 0, 1)<cr>
nnoremap <silent> ]l :call NextIndent(0, 1, 0, 1)<cr>
nnoremap <silent> [L :call NextIndent(0, 0, 1, 1)<cr>
nnoremap <silent> ]L :call NextIndent(0, 1, 1, 1)<cr>
vnoremap <silent> [l <esc>:call NextIndent(0, 0, 0, 1)<cr>m'gv''
vnoremap <silent> ]l <esc>:call NextIndent(0, 1, 0, 1)<cr>m'gv''
vnoremap <silent> [L <esc>:call NextIndent(0, 0, 1, 1)<cr>m'gv''
vnoremap <silent> ]L <esc>:call NextIndent(0, 1, 1, 1)<cr>m'gv''
onoremap <silent> [l :call NextIndent(0, 0, 0, 1)<cr>
onoremap <silent> ]l :call NextIndent(0, 1, 0, 1)<cr>
onoremap <silent> [L :call NextIndent(1, 0, 1, 1)<cr>
onoremap <silent> ]L :call NextIndent(1, 1, 1, 1)<cr>

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