What's the difference between bdw and daw? I already use "b", "e", and "w" quite a lot, so the "a" and "i" infixes seem a little redundant. Is there an advantage to the infixes that I'm not seeing?
The 'a' and 'i' in this context operate on text objects. They're much more powerful than motions. For example, beyond the 'w' for word, there is 'p' for paragraph, '"' for double quotes. All of these allow you to edit the object while the cursor is inside them.
Interesting. I'd have to use ?" and /" for double quotes, although I do have () and {} for sentences and paragraphs. I'll have to go back to the documentation -- I suppose there's a "whatever is within the current pair of parentheses" text object? I could see using that quite a lot.
Try doing `cas` (change a sentence) or `dib` (delete in brackets), and on and on for all your different text objects. This infix notations are not redundant, because they are not motions like `b` `e` `w` are, but adjectives to be applied to the nouns which are text objects.