Practical Vim, 2nd Edition

Read the Forgotten Manual

In Practical Vim, I demonstrate by showing examples rather than by describing them. That’s not easy to do with the written word. To show the steps taken during an interactive editing session, I’ve adopted a simple notation that illustrates the keystrokes and the contents of a Vim buffer side by side.

If you’re keen to jump to the action, you can safely skip this chapter for now. It describes each of the conventions used throughout Practical Vim, many of which you’ll find to be self-explanatory. At some point, you’ll probably come across a symbol and wonder what it stands for. When that happens, turn back and consult this chapter for the answer.