Vim introduction workshop

Welcome

First things first, how to start and quit Vim.

To start Vim, just type vim into the terminal.

To exit Vim, try CTRL+C like for nearly all CLIs. Vim will display a help message in the bottom left with instructions how to quit Vim:

Type :qa! and press <Enter> to abandon all changes and exit Vim

So lets type in :qa! to quit Vim again.

Settings

By default Vim comes with no useful settings. Most developers like line numbers which can be turned on by typing :set number.

Run vim lorem-ipsum.md and type :set number to activate line numbers.

If you quit Vim and re open the file, line numbers are gun. Settings adjusted within a session are not persisted. We get back to that later.

The concepts

We now have the basics, let's learn some basic concepts.

Vim is a mode editor. Most editors are mode less.

What is a mode?

NORMAL

This is the default mode when you start Vim. If you open a file, e.g. vim lorem-ipsum.md keys are used to navigate in this file. E.g. use h, j, k and l to move the cursor around.

TASK: Navigate a bit within lorem-ipsum.md.

Press ESC from any mode to come back to the NORMAL mode.

VISUAL

Sometimes you want to highlight something, e.g. for a presentation or to interact with the highlighted parts.

You can enter different Visual Modes, e.g.

v

Will start VISUAL mode where you can highlight stuff using the same keys as in NORMAL Mode.

TASK: Highlight line 19.

V

VISUAL LINE to highlight lines, useful for presentations.

TASK: Highlight line 19.

CTRL+v

VISUAL BLOCK to highlight blocks, useful for tables.

TASK: Highlight column 2.

INSERT

Insert some text, keys will be passed through as insertions.

Enter the INSERT mode by one of the following keys:

a

Append behind the cursor

i

Insert at the cursor

A

Append at the end if line

I

Insert at beginning of the line

TASK: Insert todays date at the end of the file.

REPLACE

Replace some text, keys will be passed through as replacements.

r

Replaces a single character.

R

Switches to REPLACE mode.

TASK: Replace last line with todays date.

COMMAND

Executes commands within Vim, e.g. adjust settings or quit.

:

Inserts the command mode. The cursor will be set to the command line. The command mode has auto completion, just press TAB.

TASK: Activate line numbers, quit Vim.

And there are more Modes.

Better movement

So far we now that we can move around in NORMAL mode with h, j, k and l. There are more keys to move around. E.g.:

G

Go to end of file.

gg

Go to beginning of file.

Most movements can be prefixed with a count, that's called Vim Grammar. So to move to Line x type xG.

TASK: Highlight Line 19 by jumping to Line 19.

Most of the time we are not working with text documents but source code. So how to move efficiently within source code? We will explain the help, to allow you to figure out yourself.

Help

Vim has a huuuuge documentation on board. This can be accessed via :help.

The help consists of a guide, reference, topics and plugins.

Code navigation Part 1

Let's check out :help object-motions to get further movements.

TASK: vim lorem-ipsum.php and navigate to the 2nd method via ]]

Code navigation Part 2 Plugins

There are a bunch of plugins and even some plugin manager to choose from.

To navigate within Code I use CTRLP and Tagbar in combination with Universal Ctags.

• TASK: Check out the benefits, run nvim lorem-ipsum.php and type in ,r.
• TASK: Check out the benefits, run nvim lorem-ipsum.php and type in ,b.

Code navigation Part 3 Go to definition

Vim provides support for tags out of the box. Using CTRL+] we can jump to the definition of something.

TASK: Run vim lorem-ipsum2.php to to the constructor and run CTRL+] on LoremUpsum type hint.

Efficient editing

We now know some basics to move within source code. What about editing?

Let's change the content of an PHP if condition to just false.

TASK: Change content of if condition within lorem-ipsum.php within the getSum method.

Vim provides operators within the NORMAL mode. These can be copy, delete, change, uppercase. In our case we want to change the condition = c. Following Vim Grammar, this can be combined with either a count as prefix, or a motion as suffix.

In our case we want to change text within () as this is the condition in PHP. We can achieve this by typing ci( within the braces.

What's next?

That were some basics. What is most important to you? What would you miss when using Vim? Let's provide some guidance to make you more productive within Vim in your daily work.

References

• https://daniel-siepmann.de/Posts/Migrated/2015-10-10-vim-linklist.html
• https://vimawesome.com/plugin/ctrlp-vim-red
• https://vimawesome.com/plugin/tagbar
• https://ctags.io/