Today's Featured Neovim Tips & Tricks:expand_moreFormatting an Entire BufferformattingStarting with the cursor in the middle of an un-formatted buffer : Initial Conditions <div> <p>line one</p> <p>line two</p> <p>line three</p> </div> NORMAL 50% 3:1 The first step is to execute gg , which moves the cursor to the top of the buffer: Move to Top of Buffer g g < div> <p>line one</p> <p>line two</p> <p>line three</p> </div> NORMAL Top 1:1 Next, we execute = , which tells Vim to format the lines traversed by the associated motion. We follow this with G , which indicates that we want to apply formatting from the current line to the bottom of the file: Format the Entire Buffer = G < div> <p>line one</p> <p>line two</p> <p>line three</p> </div> NORMAL Top 1:1 5 lines indented The end result shows that the combination of gg and G includes all lines in the file. Improved JeditingkeymapVim's built-in J command can be used to join the current line with the next line, which can be a very handy tool for keeping text "clean" when editing. Let's take a quick look at the default behavior. Starting from the following buffer , execute J : Before After Before Default Line o ne Line two Line three NORMAL Top 1:6 After Default J Line o ne Line two Line three NORMAL Top 1:9 Note that the second line has merged with the first, but the cursor jumped after joining the lines, which is a bit disorienting. We would prefer to join lines without having the cursor move, so in this tip we will develop a simple keymap that achieved this. For comparison, here is a quick demo of the buffer before and after the improved keymap: Before After Before Improved Line o ne Line two Line three NORMAL Top 1:6 After Improved <A-j> Line o ne Line two Line three NORMAL Top 1:6 Let's set this up, step by step. Since the default J moves the cursor, our goal is to have the cursor return to the original location, which we can achieve by setting a mark to record the cursor position before we execute J . We can use any lower-case letter, let's use z : Set Mark mz Line o ne Line two Line three NORMAL Top 1:6 Now that we have set the mark , execute the join by executing J : Join Lines J Line o ne Line two Line three NORMAL Top 1:9 As we saw before, the cursor jumped. Now, we simply jump back to the mark we previously set using `z : Jump to Mark `z Line o ne Line two Line three NORMAL Top 1:6 Now that we have compiled the steps required to get the behavior we want, let's combine the steps into the following keymap: vim . keymap . set ( "n" , "<A-j>" , "mzJ`z" ) Note that for demonstration purposes this mapping sets the alternate keymap to A-J . If you prefer this functionality over the default, then you can also override the default keymap directly by using J instead of <A-J> . Moving LineseditingkeymapReorganizing lines in a buffer is a very common task. While a yank and paste sequence could be used for each line, there is a better way. The following keymaps allow a line or group of lines to be easily moved up or down using a single keystroke: -- single-line vim . keymap . set ( "n" , "<A-j>" , ":move .+1<CR>==" ) vim . keymap . set ( "n" , "<A-k>" , ":move .-2<CR>==" ) -- multi-line vim . keymap . set ( "v" , "<A-j>" , ":move '>+1<CR>gv=gv" ) vim . keymap . set ( "v" , "<A-k>" , ":move '<-2<CR>gv=gv" ) To see how they work, consider the following buffer: Initial Conditions a = [ "one", "three", "two", "four", "five", ] NORMAL Top 1:1 Note that the words are out of order, and we would like to fix that. We start by moving the cursor to the line that we want to move (i.e. the "target" line): Move to Target Line 2j a = [ "one", "three", "two", "four", "five", ] NORMAL 38% 3:1 With this keymap, hitting A-J allows us to easily move the currently down one position, swapping its position with the line below it: Move Current Line <A-j> a = [ "one", "two", "three", "four", "five", ] NORMAL 50% 4:1 To get a better idea about what happened, consider the command that executed when we hit A-J : :move .+1<CR>== The :move command has a call signature: :m[ove] {address} and moves the current line (or selected lines) to the line below the specified address. In this case, the specified address is .+1 , which we learned in the ranges chapter means "the line below the current line". The carriage return causes the preceding command to execute, which is follows by == , which formats (indents) the line after it is moved. Let's see how this works with a visual selection . First, let's move the cursor so that the selection spans three lines: Select Multiple Lines v 2j a = [ "one", "two", "three", "four", "five", ] VISUAL 75% 6:1 Note that although the selection only touches the third line, the entire line is included in the block of lines to move. Now, move these lines up: Move Multiple Lines <A-k> a = [ "one", "three", "four", "five", "two", ] VISUAL 62% 5:1 3 lines indented The selected lines have each move up one line, and the line containing "two" (which has previously been above the selection) is now located below the selection. Prepend to Lines in SelectioneditingOccasionally while editing a document the need to prepend text to a sequence of lines comes up. For example, suppose you want to comment out some lines in a file by prepending each line with a "#" character. A simple way to achieve this is to leverage normal mode commands to apply an operation over each line in a range . To demonstrate, let's start with the following file: Initial Conditions o ne two three four five six NORMAL Top 1:1 First let move the cursor down a few lines and make a visual selection : Make Selection 2jV2j o ne two three four f ive six V-LINE 71% 5:1 Now that we have selected the lines to modify, let's build our command. First, hit : to enter command-line mode then enter normal to indicate that this command should execute in normal-mode. This tells Neovim that the following command should be executed once for each line in the selection. Finally, we type the same keystrokes that we would execute in normal mode to achieve the desired changes. In this case, we want to execute I to move the cursor to the beginning of each line and enter insert mode , then # to insert this character. :norm I# Before Executing Command one two three four f ive six COMMAND 71% 5:1 :normal I# After executing this command, we can confirm that a "#" has been inserted at the start of each line in the selection. After Executing Command one two #three #four # five six NORMAL 71% 5:1
Formatting an Entire BufferformattingStarting with the cursor in the middle of an un-formatted buffer : Initial Conditions <div> <p>line one</p> <p>line two</p> <p>line three</p> </div> NORMAL 50% 3:1 The first step is to execute gg , which moves the cursor to the top of the buffer: Move to Top of Buffer g g < div> <p>line one</p> <p>line two</p> <p>line three</p> </div> NORMAL Top 1:1 Next, we execute = , which tells Vim to format the lines traversed by the associated motion. We follow this with G , which indicates that we want to apply formatting from the current line to the bottom of the file: Format the Entire Buffer = G < div> <p>line one</p> <p>line two</p> <p>line three</p> </div> NORMAL Top 1:1 5 lines indented The end result shows that the combination of gg and G includes all lines in the file.
Improved JeditingkeymapVim's built-in J command can be used to join the current line with the next line, which can be a very handy tool for keeping text "clean" when editing. Let's take a quick look at the default behavior. Starting from the following buffer , execute J : Before After Before Default Line o ne Line two Line three NORMAL Top 1:6 After Default J Line o ne Line two Line three NORMAL Top 1:9 Note that the second line has merged with the first, but the cursor jumped after joining the lines, which is a bit disorienting. We would prefer to join lines without having the cursor move, so in this tip we will develop a simple keymap that achieved this. For comparison, here is a quick demo of the buffer before and after the improved keymap: Before After Before Improved Line o ne Line two Line three NORMAL Top 1:6 After Improved <A-j> Line o ne Line two Line three NORMAL Top 1:6 Let's set this up, step by step. Since the default J moves the cursor, our goal is to have the cursor return to the original location, which we can achieve by setting a mark to record the cursor position before we execute J . We can use any lower-case letter, let's use z : Set Mark mz Line o ne Line two Line three NORMAL Top 1:6 Now that we have set the mark , execute the join by executing J : Join Lines J Line o ne Line two Line three NORMAL Top 1:9 As we saw before, the cursor jumped. Now, we simply jump back to the mark we previously set using `z : Jump to Mark `z Line o ne Line two Line three NORMAL Top 1:6 Now that we have compiled the steps required to get the behavior we want, let's combine the steps into the following keymap: vim . keymap . set ( "n" , "<A-j>" , "mzJ`z" ) Note that for demonstration purposes this mapping sets the alternate keymap to A-J . If you prefer this functionality over the default, then you can also override the default keymap directly by using J instead of <A-J> .
Moving LineseditingkeymapReorganizing lines in a buffer is a very common task. While a yank and paste sequence could be used for each line, there is a better way. The following keymaps allow a line or group of lines to be easily moved up or down using a single keystroke: -- single-line vim . keymap . set ( "n" , "<A-j>" , ":move .+1<CR>==" ) vim . keymap . set ( "n" , "<A-k>" , ":move .-2<CR>==" ) -- multi-line vim . keymap . set ( "v" , "<A-j>" , ":move '>+1<CR>gv=gv" ) vim . keymap . set ( "v" , "<A-k>" , ":move '<-2<CR>gv=gv" ) To see how they work, consider the following buffer: Initial Conditions a = [ "one", "three", "two", "four", "five", ] NORMAL Top 1:1 Note that the words are out of order, and we would like to fix that. We start by moving the cursor to the line that we want to move (i.e. the "target" line): Move to Target Line 2j a = [ "one", "three", "two", "four", "five", ] NORMAL 38% 3:1 With this keymap, hitting A-J allows us to easily move the currently down one position, swapping its position with the line below it: Move Current Line <A-j> a = [ "one", "two", "three", "four", "five", ] NORMAL 50% 4:1 To get a better idea about what happened, consider the command that executed when we hit A-J : :move .+1<CR>== The :move command has a call signature: :m[ove] {address} and moves the current line (or selected lines) to the line below the specified address. In this case, the specified address is .+1 , which we learned in the ranges chapter means "the line below the current line". The carriage return causes the preceding command to execute, which is follows by == , which formats (indents) the line after it is moved. Let's see how this works with a visual selection . First, let's move the cursor so that the selection spans three lines: Select Multiple Lines v 2j a = [ "one", "two", "three", "four", "five", ] VISUAL 75% 6:1 Note that although the selection only touches the third line, the entire line is included in the block of lines to move. Now, move these lines up: Move Multiple Lines <A-k> a = [ "one", "three", "four", "five", "two", ] VISUAL 62% 5:1 3 lines indented The selected lines have each move up one line, and the line containing "two" (which has previously been above the selection) is now located below the selection.
Prepend to Lines in SelectioneditingOccasionally while editing a document the need to prepend text to a sequence of lines comes up. For example, suppose you want to comment out some lines in a file by prepending each line with a "#" character. A simple way to achieve this is to leverage normal mode commands to apply an operation over each line in a range . To demonstrate, let's start with the following file: Initial Conditions o ne two three four five six NORMAL Top 1:1 First let move the cursor down a few lines and make a visual selection : Make Selection 2jV2j o ne two three four f ive six V-LINE 71% 5:1 Now that we have selected the lines to modify, let's build our command. First, hit : to enter command-line mode then enter normal to indicate that this command should execute in normal-mode. This tells Neovim that the following command should be executed once for each line in the selection. Finally, we type the same keystrokes that we would execute in normal mode to achieve the desired changes. In this case, we want to execute I to move the cursor to the beginning of each line and enter insert mode , then # to insert this character. :norm I# Before Executing Command one two three four f ive six COMMAND 71% 5:1 :normal I# After executing this command, we can confirm that a "#" has been inserted at the start of each line in the selection. After Executing Command one two #three #four # five six NORMAL 71% 5:1