Date: Wed, 25 Sep 1996 14:38:35 -0700 (PDT) From: Gary Kline <kline@tera.com> To: doc@freebsd.org Subject: vi tutorial overview, ASCII version. Message-ID: <199609252138.OAA18165@athena.tera.com>
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Enclosed is the ASCII version of the overview on vi that I'm working on. Feedback, people?? gary kline @(#) HowVi.ascii. 25sep96 This ``Using vi'' tutorial is intented to be a brief overview; something that, within 20 to 30 minutes, will jump-start you on the road to learning the basics of vi. Read through and work with this once or twice. To launch yourself into a higher orbit of skill and understanding, check out the References toward the bottom. Using vi The vi text editor is a widely available visual, full-screen text editor. vi is a powerful editor, and it is also old--and this shows. vi was created at a time when most terminals did not have arrow keys. Because of this, vi is modal: it has several modes it can be in, with its behavior changing depending on mode. Readers who are at workstations should open a second window and to try out vi commands as they work through this overview. If you have access to only one window or screen, print a hardcopy of this overview. A parenthetical note: ((You can really begin to edit documents with only a few commands: either the arrow-keys or ``h'', ``j'', ``k'', and `l''. Plus the backspace key and ths spacebar. These keys will move you around the screen--if you are in command mode. Then with ``i'' to insert and ``ESC'' to get back into command mode, you can enter text. ``x'' to delete a character and ``r'' to replace a character round out the minimal techniques. But, I'm getting ahead of myself, so on with this tutorial. . . .)) Starting and stopping To start up vi, change to your home directory and type % vi samp This will start vi editing a (theoretically) new file named ``samp.'' If samp already exists it will be loaded and displayed upon your screen. Many different commands can be used to exit vi. Typing :wq will write the file to disk and quit. Typing :q will quit if no changes have been made. If changes have been made then you must type :q! to quit without saving changes. (Note that when you type a colon and are in command mode, the cursor will move to the bottom left corner of your screen.) These few commands are enough to suggest the main frustration new users have with vi--there are many commands to memorize, and many like ``ZZ'' make no sense at all. They have been added often as add-ons, and are simply part of the program. At first, it is probably best to find one way of doing something and sticking with it. You can and will add more skills as you go along. Inserting text Initially vi is in command mode. Most (not all) keys entered are commands to vi itself and will not enter text. Typing ``i'' is the command to enter text-input mode. vi inserts all non-control characters typed while in text-input mode into the document. Some characters in this mode have special meanings; the backspace key, for example, backs over mistakes. ((If you do accidentally change something in your vi session, the ``u'' command will undo it when you are in command mode.)) Text can also inserted by typing ``a''. This will add it following the current character. Press ``ESC'' to get out when you are finished. If you type ``o'' (lower-case), you will open a line immediately below where your cursor is. An upper-case ``O'' will insert an empty line above your cursor. And some parallels here with ``A'' and ``I.'' If you type an ``A'' on any line, the cursor will move to the end of the text and be ready to append text. Typing ``I'' will prepare vi to insert text at the beginning of the line. Try typing something, like four lines from this tutorial if nothing else comes to mind. When you are through typing, to leave text-input mode, press the ``ESC'' key to get back into command mode. Deleting text To delete an entire line, press ``dd''. To delete a character, press ``x''. ``10dd'' will delete 10 lines, and ``5x'' will delete 5 characters. Try these deletion commands now. Undo each, if you wish, by typing ``u''. Once you have used ``dd'', the text is placed in a buffer. To move the text you can place the cursor at the point where you want it to appear and then type ``p''. This is equivalent to a block move. A block is copied by using ``yy'' or ``10yy'' (or use any number instead of 10) to yank into the buffer and then using p normally. ``p''--lower case--places the block below the current line. ``P''--upper case--places the block above the line where your cursor currently is. Typing ``D'' will delete the rest of the line---from wherever you have the cursor to the end of that line. If you want to delete text from wherever you have the cursor is until you find a specific character, ``dfcharacter'' will do that for you. If you place the cursor at the beginning of a word and type ``dw'' vi will delete just that word. Cursor movement Note that in some cases you cannot use the arrow keys while in insert mode. With some kinds of hardware you can. The only way to determine whether you can use your arrow keys in text-input mode is to experiment. As a rule of thumb, the cursor can be moved with the arrow keys as long as you are not in text-input mode. The lower-case letters ``h", ``j'', ``k'' and ``l'' also mimic the arrow keys. Backwards, downward, upward, and forward one space or line respectively. The backspace key moves the cursor one space backwards; the spacebar moves one space forward. ((If you use some straightforward re-mapping tricks you can map the arrow keys to the h,j,k,l keys. Such mapping tricks are beyond the intent of this overview, however. --See the References section below. )) As a rule of thumb, the cursor can be moved with the arrow keys as long as you are not in text-input mode. ``h", ``j'', ``k'' and ``l'' also mimic the arrow keys. Backwards, downward, upward, and forward one space or line respectively. ``0'' (zero) will move the cursor to the beginning of the line, ``$'' will take you to the end. ''G'' will go to the end of a file. Typing ``numberG'' will move you to the line ``number'' And then typing two apostrophes will move you back to where you were. If you were on, say, line 4, then typed ``15G'' followed by '' you would go from line 4 to 15 and back to line 4. Typing :10 will take you to line 10. Any number can be used in place of 10. ``^F'' (cntl-F) will page forward one screen, ``^B'' (cntl-B) goes back one screen. Replacing text (while in command mode) You can replace a single character by typing ``r'' followed by the new value. Use ``R'' to replace a whole group of characters. By placing the cursor on the first letter of a word and typing ``cw'' you are ready to change the entire word. After you have typed in your replacement, hit ``ESC'' to get back into command more. Typing ``C'' from wherever the cursor is to the end of the line will ready vi to let you re-type the line. If you type ``cfcharacter'' where character is an ASCII character, vi will let you change the string from whereever the cursor is until it finds the character. Be sure to type ``ESC'' when you are done replacing. The period or dot ``.'' means ``Repeat the last command''. --So it is possible to make accidental changes to your file while you are still in command mode, but you should not find this too much trouble.-- Typing ``.'' in command mode is an effective means of replacing various sections of text easily and quickly. Finding and replacing text To find a string, type / followed by what you want to find. Note that when you type a slash in vi--in command mode--, your cursor moves to the bottom left-hand corner of your screen. For example, /Pascal finds the next occurrence of the word ``Pascal,'' starting at the current cursor position. ``n'' finds the next occurrence. To replace text, type :s/pascal/Pascal/ This will replace the first occurrence of ``pascal'' with ``Pascal'' And the following: :1,$s/pascal/Pascal/g will do the replace globally throughout the document. (From the 1st line, ``1'' to the end, ``$'') Miscellaneous features Here are some miscellaneous features of vi that both new and skilled users employ. The set commands. Typing ``:set feature'' lets you set a variety of features commonly used in editing and for programming. Here are a few examples. :set autoindent will automatically indent the next line to the same indentation as you typed above. To back out of any indentation, you must type a Control-D. Typing :set noautoindent unsets the autoindent feature. :set showmatch will tell the editor to show you matching cases or parenthesis and braces. This is useful in many programming languages. Using showmatch, vi will blink each matching pair of parens or braces. :set noshowmatch unsets the feature :set nunmber causes vi to display number lines along the left-hand side of your display. :set nonunmber gets rid of the line numbers. Executing a command from within vi. Typing ``:! command'' will temporarily escape you back to your shell and execute ``command''. For example: :!ls -l will present you with a long listing of whatever files are in your current directory. As soon as the listing is complete, you will be back inside vi and a colon prompt will be displayed at the lower left-hand corner of your display. Reading another file into vi Typing ``:r filename'' will cause vi to include the file ``filename'' within your current file at the linenumber of your cursor. For example :r letter_to_jack will cause the file ``letter_to_jack'' to be read into your current file. Here, you need to be sure at exactly what linenumber you want to have ``letter_to_jack'' inserted and be sure that your cursor is at that line. Note that you can always undo the insertion by typing ``ESC u'' References This brief overview will get you going with vi. After you have become familiar with these few commands and want to learn more, there are a number of avenues. One is to simply ask friends or colleagues; another is to read of one the many commercial tutorials on vi. Jerry Peek, Tim O'Reilly and others have a bunch of tricks and techniques for getting the most out of vi in Unix Power Tools. A third is to check out the online documentation on nvi by Keith Bostic. You will find this file in /usr/share/doc/usd/13.viref, paper.ascii.gz. Another online document titled ``An Introduction to Display Editing with vi,'' by Bill Joy and Mark Horton lives in /usr/share/doc/usd/12.vi/paper.ascii.gz This fourth reference is the original paper on vi. You can scroll through these gzip'd docs with the zmore utility. Following are ftp or http sites that have tutorial documentation on using the vi editor. There is an exceptionally well-written vi FAQ available at: http://www.macom.co.il/vi/index.html that has all files in HTML format. This site will give you considerably more information that in this overview. And in Norway at alf.uib.no in /pub/vi, the following files are available for anonymous ftp: -rw-r--r-- 1 20035 5881 Sep 24 1993 HELP -rw-r--r-- 1 20035 15249 May 20 1995 INDEX -rw-r--r-- 1 20035 1123 Jun 23 1992 WHO drwxr-xr-x 2 20035 1536 Jun 19 07:39 comp.editors -rw-r--r-- 1 20035 16247 May 25 20:06 comp.editors.EDS -rw-r--r-- 1 20035 9569 Aug 11 1992 comp.editors.FAQ -rw-r--r-- 1 20035 2822 Feb 28 1994 comp.editors.PNT -rw-r--r-- 1 20035 1416 Jul 25 1993 comp.editors2 -rw-r--r-- 1 20035 990 Aug 8 1993 comp.editors3 drwxr-xr-x 2 20035 2048 Jun 19 07:39 docs drwxr-xr-x 2 20035 1536 Jun 19 06:42 macros drwxr-xr-x 4 20035 512 Jun 19 07:12 programs drwx------ 2 20035 1024 Jun 19 07:39 t 226 Transfer complete. In the docs directory are several dozen compressed files from one to several years old. Several seem worth downloading and reviewing if you really want to hone your vi skills. Bottom line: there is lots of freely available literature on learning vi out there. Concluding remarks If you are determined to learn a particular skill, you will; even something that seems as arcane as the vi editor. vi will almost certainly grow on you. Especially as you become more proficient, vi, with all its tricks and shortcut commands will let you edit a file very efficiently. It will probably help to keep a HowTo file, either on paper or online to keep track of how to do various things in vi. After a few days of using vi, you're on your way toward its mastery. The version of vi in FreeBSD was written by Keith Bostic and named nvi. nvi and nex--the clone of the original ``ex''-- excell in their functionality and concept. Bostic claims that nvi is a ``feature-for-feature, bug-for-bug'' replacement for the original program written by Bill Joy. I have found it to be even a bit better than the original. People who can find at least two such improvements get gold stars by their names! -- This tutorial was begun by Marshall Brain and augmented by Phil Pfeiffer and Brian Sherwood (1993). Gary Kline futher elaborated enhanced this with the kind help of many folks interested in the FreeBSD Project. Gary Kline also put this document into markup format (1996) . If you have ideas on how this brief introduction to vi can be improved, please forward your ideas to kline@tao.thought.orghelp
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