Vim Tips and Tricks

As I learn more about vim, I plan to document the tips and tricks I learn here.

how to set tab to 4 spaces in vim

Add the following into your .vimrc file:

set tabstop=4
set shiftwidth=4
set expandtab

how to set replace all tabs with a space

:%s/\t/ /g

how to highlight spelling errors

set spell spelllang=en_us

vimdiff or hg merge

This is a list of some common commands when using vimdiff:

ctrl w (twice)

switch windows

do

diff obtain, take the other window's differences. Pull the change.

dp

diff put, give the other window our differences. Push the change.

[c

move focus to previous difference.

]c

move focus to next difference.

:diffupdate

diff update

:diffget <window number>

get changes from specified window number and place them into current window.

:diffput <window number>

put changes from current window into specified window number.

zo

open folded text

zc

close folded text