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Introduction to vim as an editor

If you've never used a terminal-based text editor, vim can be quite intimidating. I want to show you the basics of using it and explain some terminology I will be using throughout this repository.

Everything I talk about here applies to neovim in the exact same way, but for simplicity I will just refer to both as "vim". Anytime I run the vim command in a terminal, just think nvim instead if you use neovim.

Opening and closing

You can run vim simply by running it as a command in your terminal:

$ vim

You can pass a file or directory to it as an argument, which will open that file / directory immediately.

# Open a file balled `balls.rs`
$ vim balls.rs

# Open a directory called `src`
$ vim src

# Open the current directory
$ vim .

You can quit by typing :q! and hitting the "enter" key. Alternatively you can also press ZQ.

Modal editing

vim is what is called a "modal" editor. This means that there are multiple modes which you can switch between. I talk about this in detail in Getting started with vim motions, but for now all you need to know is that by default you are in normal mode. Any key you press here is associated with some form of command. The most important key right now is :. It will put your cursor in the bottom left of the screen, which means you are now in command mode. Here you can run commands. The most important command is :help. It will open a text document explaining the basics of vim, and I recommend you read through it!

Notation

Depending on the situation notation will differ slightly, but for the most part I will use the following:

  • h => the h key on your keyboard
  • H => shift + h (capitalization matters!)
  • CTRL-h => the "ctrl" key held down, followed by the h key
  • CTRL-H => same thing as above, your terminal cannot differentiate between the two anyway
  • <C-h> => also same as above
  • <A-h> => "alt" key held down, followed by the h key
  • <BS> => the "backspace" key
  • <Tab> => the "tab" key
  • <Esc> => the "escape" key
  • <Space> => the "space" key
  • <CR> => "carriage return" aka. "enter"
  • <Leader>h => your "leader" key pressed once, followed by the h key

I talk about the leader key in Getting to know your editor in the keymaps section.

For information on notation in help files specifically, see :help notation.

Editor layout

vim is made up of 6 basic UI components.

At the bottom of your screen you will see what's called the "statusline" (see :help statusline).

On the left, hidden by default, is the "statuscolumn" (see :help statuscolumn). You can show it by displaying something like line numbers (:set number).

At the top, also hidden by default, is the "tabline" (see :help tabline). It will show when you have more than 1 tab open, or if you have a custom one that is always displayed.

When pressing : a command line will pop up at the bottom (as mentioned previously).

Finally, you have at least 1 window which is displaying a buffer. Each window can have its own "winbar", which is a line of text at the top of the window (see :help winbar).

How to use :help

If you run vim with no arguments, you should see an intro screen. This screen gives you some hints for first steps, the most important of which is :help. Running :help :help will show you a help page on the :help command! You should read through just :help, it will show you how to navigate the help docs, follow links, etc. This will be vital, as I will refer to various :help documents throughout this repository. :help is probably one of the most extensive pieces of documentation you will ever read, and you should know how to use it. The most important things to remember are:

  • CTRL-] will follow the link below your cursor
  • CTRL-o will jump back
  • CTRL-w followed by o will make the current window fullscreen.