VI command cheatsheet

As a developer, we love editor, we spent our most of the time using GUI editor. But sometimes, we do use CLI editor for deployment or DevOps operation. Due to infrequent or rare use of CLI editor, we forget their commands.

VI is one of such popular command line editor. Some shell can also be run in VI mode. So knowing VI command will not only help in editing but will also help in working with Shell. This post is all about creating a cheat sheet of commonly used VI command for quick reference.

Open, Mode & Quit

By default when we open a file with VI, it opens in command mode. You won’t be able to edit it until you switch it to insert mode. VI operate in two modes: Insert & Command. ‘Command mode’ is used to run command and ‘Insert mode’ is used to edit the file.

Description	Command
opend/edit file	vi filename
switch to insert mode at cuurent cursor	i
switch to command mode	esc
save file	:w
save file & quit	:wq
quit without saving file	:q!
switch to insert mode by moving cursor at start of line	I
switch to insert mode by moving cursor next to current character	a
switch to insert mode by moving cursor at end of line	A
switch to insert mode by creating new blank line below current line	o
switch to insert mode by creating new blank line above current line	O

Move

Move command is about moving the cursor from one point to another point inside vi editors. These commands are very important because these same commands are combined with another command like cut, copy, paste & delete.

Description	Command
go up	k
go down	j
go left	h
go right	l
go to start of line	0
go to end of line	$
go to start of next word	w
go to start of previous word	b
go to first line of file	1G
go to last line of file	G
go to nth line of file	nG
go to start of next screen	ctrl+f
go to start of previous screen	ctrl+b

Cut, Copy & Paste

Main key button for copy(yank) is y, we can combine this key with 'move key' to acheive various copy requirement. Cutting means deleting, So use all the delete command for cut operation. General Steps to copy & paste:

1. Move to place from where you want to cut/copy using 'move command'
2. Copy using key y or Cut using key d
3. Move to place till where you want to copy/cut using 'move command'
4. Move to place where you want to paste using 'move command'
5. Paste using key p

Description	Command
cut	d
copy	y
paste	p
copy next word from current cursor	yw
copy next n number of words from current cursor	nyw
copy current line	yy
copy next n number of line from current line	nyy
copy characters from current cursor to start of line	y0
copy characters from current cursor to end of line	y$
copy from current line to nth line	ynG
copy from line number x to line numer z	xGyzG
copy from first line to last line of file	1GyG
paste copied line below current cursor	p
paste copied line above current cursor	P

Undo & Redo

Description	Command
undo	u
redo	ctrl + r

Delete

Main key button for delete is d, we can combine this key with 'move key' to acheive various delete requirement.

Description	Command
delete next character from current cursor	x
delete next n number of characters from current cursor	nx
delete next word from current cursor	dw
delete next n number of words from current cursor	ndw
delete current line	dd
delete next n number of line from current line	ndd
delete characters from current cursor to start of line	d0
delete characters from current cursor to end of line	d$
delete from current line to nth line	dnG
delete from line number x to line numer y	xGdyG
delete from first line to last line of file	1GdG

Find & Replace

Description	Command
find text 'search_txt' in forward direction	/search_txt
find text 'search_txt' in backward direction	?search_txt
move to next occurrence of search result in forward direction	n
move to next occurrence of search result in backward direction	N
find for text 'search_text', use key n to go to next search result	/search_text
find text 'searchtxt' and replace with text 'replacetxt'	/search_txt/replace_txt
find text 'searchtxt' and replace with text 'replacetxt' at line level	/search_txt/replace_txt/n
find text 'searchtxt' and replace with text 'replacetxt' at file level	/search_txt/replace_txt/gn
find text 'searchtxt' and replace with text 'replacetxt' but confirm before replace	/search_txt/replace_txt/gcn

Setting

Setting is used to modify the default behavior of VI editor.

Description	Command
set line number	:set nu
set auto indentetion	:set au
set to ignore case while searching	:set ic