Mastering the Vim Language

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Strong rec begemotz · 2016-11 · on “How to start using VIM?”

In video form, the best introduction I have seen is Chris Toomey’s ‘Mastering the Vim Language’: [this video] But here is something I wrote while I was learning how to migrate to Vim.. [LINK]

Strong rec dredmorbius · 2019-03 · on “Vim Anti-Patterns (2012)”

Disclaimer: My vim knowledge has many gaps. Understanding vim's model, what Chris Toomey of Thoughtbot calls "the Vim Language", helps incredibly: [this video] I've picked up numerous tips watching this and other of Thoughtbot's excellent video series. More importantly, though, is that I've learned why specific vim idioms and motifs exist. They've lead me to rethink my own usage patterns, sometimes changing them, sometimes holding them just a bit more tightly. (Say, my practice of doing global regex pattern-replacement edits rather than repeated vim edits or macros, generally.) But for a tool I use for coding, data cleaning, systems administration, email, writing, document preparation, and more,

Strong rec dredmorbius · 2026-05 · on “It's time to talk about my writerdeck”

My first experience, on a BSD machine at about the same time, was similarly traumatic. I've since learnt the tool. Its ubiquity (particularly over pretty much all of the other ones I'd listed, at least on the machines I had ready access to) cemented that. I did like EVE when I'd used it, but have had little access to VAXen since. And was proficient for a time on Emacs (until a subsequent gig's director insisted that if it didn't come installed software wouldn't be added to our Unix server). My WP-fu fell with the end of DOS, though I did hang on for quite some time, up to the late 1990s / early aughts. CUA has its benefits, but it is only one of multiple competing keyboard standards. Everyth

Recommends dredmorbius · 2019-05 · on “Intermediate Vim”

Recommended: Learn vim For the Last Time: A Tutorial and Primer [LINK] Mastering the Vim Language [this video] An Incremental Approach to Vim [LINK]

Recommends urmish · 2020-07 · on “How Did Vim Become So Popular?”

The parent described only a fraction of what vim can do. The notion of text objects and combining them with plugins makes vim much more powerful. Even without plugins mastering vim makes writing code quite natural. [this video]

Recommends tantony · 2022-10 · on “Ask HN: How to become good at Emacs/Vim?”

I dabbled with neovim on and off for a while - kind of following the same logic as you, wanting to be like many people I saw on Youtube. It never really worked since I was really comfortable with my existing workflow - vscode + iterm and "swiping" between screens on macOS. I was super-fast with the Macbook trackpad with its sensitivity turned up to the max. It finally clicked when I started a job where I had to use a windows laptop with a linux VM as my primary computer. I found that using vscode either within the VM or over "Remote-SSH" from windows was severely cramping my productivity. So I switched to NeoVim+Tmux cold turkey (SSHing into VM using "Windows Terminal"). I set up some shortc

Recommends jsilence · 2025-05 · on “Edamagit: Magit for VSCode”

Have been using Spacemacs and Doom Emacs some time ago, but turned off evil mode, bc I was not used to vim style editing. Lately I understood that vim key bindings is actually an editing language and finally found joy in vim [0]. Surely going to return to Doom-Emacs with evil mode on. Maybe switching to evil god mode later. [0] [this video]