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Photo by
Alex Knight
on
Unsplash |
So, now that you installed Vim on your Mac, Windows or Linux workstation, learned how to get started with Vim and mastered your first Vim tutorial, let's review tips and tricks to keep learning Vim.
Why learn Vim?
First things first: why learn Vim? In case you haven't ready already, consider first reading our 20+ reasons to learn and use Vim. Then resume with this article.
Why keep learning Vim?
If you know already the basics of Vim, why should you bother learning more?
Because learning at bit of it every day will yield great rewards in the long run. It takes years to master Vim. The more you learn, the more you realize that time is that secret ingredient in getting comfortable, becoming proficient and efficient with Vim. It's like learning to bike or playing a musical instrument. It takes time, effort and discipline but once you master it, the gains are endless.
This graph shows well how Vim scales over time:
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Source:
lucasfcosta.com |
Thinking in Vim
The ultimate goal is to think in Vim. In other words, use all of the fantastic assets that Vim and VimL (Vim's programming language) provide to us for your benefit. We'll discuss more about that in the future and take you through concrete.
Using Vim's built-in help
Vim's built-in help is a fantastic asset to keep learning Vim. Learned a new trick? Consider exploring what's available in the help about that. To open the help, type in Normal mode:
Accessing the help is simply typing :help in normal mode to access the help or :help <cmd> where <cmd> is the command (or keystroke, or keyword....) that you're interested to learn about.
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Vim's built-in help opened with the
:help command |
Getting help on Vim's help
Vim's help is pretty extensive and complete. We encourage you to read it and use it as much as you can. It will not only help you get used to Vim's terminology but also be a solid reference for your questions before Stack Overflow. To get help on Vim's help, run:
And if you need more help on how to use the help 🙄, run:
Jumping Around
Since you will probably want to move through sections of the documentation, here are some useful shortcuts to have in mind:
- Ctrl-] - jump to the manual related to the subject under the cursor
- Ctrl-o - jump back. You can keep repeating the command to jump back to previous positions.
How to keep learning Vim?
Okay, so how to keep learning Vim. Here are are our main tips:
- Read Vim's manual page
- Redo multiple times Vim's tutorial
- Always read Vim's built-in help (:help) as explained above
- Read different books about Vim
- Learn VimL
- Explore open-source repostories
- Play with Vim Plugins
- Watch talks and more talks about Vim
