Last edit: <2020-08-04>

vim language quick reference

Example command di" (| is the cursor below):

somefunc("here is a |string") --> somefunc("")

The general form is <action> <operator> <text object>, or as I like to think, <action> <verb> <noun>. Verbs modify nouns.

So, for di" above:

d is the action (delete)
i is the verb (inside)
" is the noun (matching quotes)

Verbs are optional depending on the noun, but with this outline there are many commands you compose.

1 Actions ⚓

action	mnemonic	meaning
c	change	delete and enter insert mode
d	delete	delete
g	go	movement/jump to
p	paste	paste
r	replace	replace
v	visual	enter visual mode
y	yank	copy

2 Verbs ⚓

verb	mnemonic	meaning
a	around	inclusive of noun selector
i	inside	exclusive of noun selector
f	find	forward to character, inclusive
F	backward to character, inclusive
t	till	forward to character, exclusive (character is the verb)
T	backward to character, exclusive

3 Nouns ⚓

noun	mnemonic	meaning
b	block	blocks of surrounding `([{` (implicit)
p	paragraph	paragraph
s	sentence	sentence
t	tag	`<tags> pairs of </tags>`
w	word	word
%	matching [{( under cursor, inclusive
`/`	forward to search result
<,>	`<tags> pairs of </tags>`
?	backward to search result
`'`, `"`, `	surrounding "'` pairs
`(`, `[`, `{`, `}`, `]`, `}`	surrounding `([{` pairs

You can install plugins to get more nouns and nice contextual actions. For example with tpope’s commentary you get a gc action for commenting in whatever programming language you are in – which you can compose with any of the above nouns and verbs!