
VIM from novice to professional by: Derek Wyatt  - ahmicro
http://ontwik.com/tools/vim-from-novice-to-professional-by-derek-wyatt-p1/
======
wccrawford
Some really good tips for novices (and probably some pros that missed a few
tips), but I hate the evangelizing.

"Do it the way it's meant to be done!" ... NO. Do it the way that works best.
If you can get around easier with hjkl, go for it. If you find the arrow keys
to be WAY faster, use them. All that matters is that you get the job done. If
we always did it 'the way it was meant to be done' we'd never have progress.

~~~
javert
Taken out of context, the advice to "do it the way it's meant to be done" is
not very good advice, as you point out.

But in the context of talking about how to navigate within vim, it's really
worthwile to use hjlk instead of the arrow keys; it's provably way more
efficient.

~~~
pyrhho
'jkl;' for the win! 'hjkl' always seemed awkward and never made sense to me.
'hjkl' is supposed to be convenient so that you never need to move your right
hand to navigate the file, but you don't type with your fingers on 'hjkl', you
type with them on 'jkl;'. I remapped my vim to 'jkl;' and am loving it.
(Though it is a bit of a pain for less, and other vim-keyed applications).

For those interested, you can remap to use 'jkl;' with:

    
    
      " Navigate with jkl; instead of hjkl
      noremap ; l
      noremap l k
      noremap k j
      noremap j h
    

Edit: Being a bit nicer to vim's authors...

~~~
lelele
> 'hjkl' always seemed awkward and dumb to me.

Except that you press J, K and even L way more times than H and thus is makes
a lot of sense having them right there under your strongest fingers.

~~~
pyrhho
If your middle and ring fingers are not strong enough to push the buttons, you
need a better keyboard.

In all seriousness, though, I personally don't like having to reach with my
index finger to move left. I tend to think of 'jkl;' as being a more efficient
set of arrow-keys. (Where, with the arrow keys, your index finger goes left,
ring-finger goes right, and middle finger goes up-down).

If you can hack it with 'hjkl' more power to you, but I found it extremely
annoying to have to 'reset' my hand position every time I wanted to type text
in insert mode.

~~~
lelele
> but I found it extremely annoying to have to 'reset' my hand position every
> time I wanted to type text in insert mode.

What do you mean, please? Do you mean you were resting your right finger over
H?

~~~
pyrhho
Yeah, I kept finding myself trying to use 'hjkl' like arrow keys, then when I
went into insert mode I would have to move my hand back (and lose my train of
thought). Basically, 'jkl;' feels more intuitive to me. Hardcore vim users
will probably be aghast at remapping something as basic as cursor movement and
say that I should "learn to do it right". But it makes more sense to me, and I
haven't found it to be any less efficient.

~~~
lelele
I understand now. I've read about people remapping them as JKIL too. I guess
the cause is the same.

------
roadnottaken
He's obnoxious, I couldn't watch more than a few minutes. How is this better
than a tutorial/cheat-sheet?

~~~
jeremydavid
Sorry to sound like an asshole, but I have to agree with you - this guy is
annoyingly obnoxious. In the first minute of the first screen cast all he was
able to highlight was that Canadians don't live in igloos, and that he thought
his "neighbours to the south" were ignorant.

I am keen to learn how to use VIM effectively, but I can't sit through these
videos. Please, anyone out there, take this guys idea but do it right. Put
together a series that emphases the content - not the guy presenting it.

~~~
steveklabnik
Have you seen VimCasts? <http://vimcasts.org/>

~~~
spacemanaki
He's writing a book too! Can't wait:
[http://vimcasts.org/blog/2010/11/working-title-practical-
vim...](http://vimcasts.org/blog/2010/11/working-title-practical-vim/)

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Deadsunrise
10 flash videos on one page and just a tiny "credits" link to the author? Only
thanks to Flashblock my computer is not dying.

I also don't see the point of embedding all the videos. For example in this
one: <http://ontwik.com/ruby/david-hansson-why-ruby/> why doesn't the credits
link to the source of the video? You know, the people who recorded, edited and
released it at [http://confreaks.net/videos/431-rubyconf2010-keynote-why-
rub...](http://confreaks.net/videos/431-rubyconf2010-keynote-why-ruby)

~~~
ahmicro
Yes you are right, May be the little "credit" is nothing but I'm working to
add more info about the authors and how it works ,Thanks for critique i loved
it.

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mrinterweb
My favorite way to learn vim was vimtutor, but unfortunately vimtutor ends too
soon. There is so much that vimtutor does not cover. Does anyone know of an
advanced vimtutor?

~~~
wyclif
No, but there's a surprising amount of great material to learn in :help. I'd
also recommend the newest edition of the vi/vim O'Reilly book.

------
dingle_thunk
First impressions of vim: text editor for douche-bags

~~~
traverse
Look beyond your first impression. Don't worry about the so called douche-
bags.

I am a light VIM user, but I do a lot of scripting on Windows for work. I
spend a great deal of time working in consoles for wsf and ps1 files. Having
an editor I can use "inline" with my workflow is priceless. I'm not a power
user, my vimrc is all of 8 lines, but I can get in make an edit and get back
out without losing step. Plus having one editor on all platforms means the
things I _do_ manage to learn at work can also be used at home (on Fedora).

TL;DR Don't worry about a programs perceived user base. Measure it by what it
can do for you.

~~~
adamesque
He's referring to the unbelievably obnoxious narrator of these screencasts.

~~~
dasil003
Right, but it's amazing he's never heard of vim before.

~~~
BrandonM
I think we're forgetting that Hacker News is attracting an increasingly broad
audience. How many random strangers would you have to ask before finding one
who knows what vim is? How many computer science majors? It's easy to forget
that "Unix-based hackers" is a _very_ small minority, even among a somewhat
technical audience.

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angrycoder
Dear Author,

More Vim, less you.

------
cicatrix_manet
much prefer VIM from novice to pro by: Derek SMART.

