Learning the vi and Vim Editors

There's nothing that hard-core Unix and Linux users are more fanatical about than their text editor. Editors are the subject of adoration and worship, or of scorn and ridicule, depending upon whether the topic of discussion is your editor or someone else's. vihas been the standard editor for close to 30 years. Popular on Unix and Linux, it has a growing following on Windows systems, too. Most experienced system administrators citevias their tool of choice.
And since 1986, this book has beentheguide forvi. However, Unix systems are not what they were 30 years ago, and neither is this book. While retaining all the valuable features of previous editions, the 7th edition ofLearning the vi and vim Editorshas been expanded to include detailed information onvim, the leadingviclone.vimis the default version ofvion most Linux systems and on Mac OS X, and is available for many other operating systems too. With this guide, you learn text editing basics and advanced tools for both editors, such as multi-window editing, how to write both interactive macros and scripts to extend the editor, and power tools for programmers -- all in the easy-to-follow style that has made this book a classic. Learning the vi and vim Editorsincludes: A complete introduction to text editing with vi: - How to move aroundviin a hurry - Beyond the basics, such as using buffers - vi'sglobal search and replacement - Advanced editing, including customizingviand executing Unix commands How to make full use of vim: - Extended text objects and more powerful regular expressions - Multi-window editing and powerfulvimscripts - How to make full use of the GUI version ofvim, calledgvim - vim'senhancements for programmers, such as syntax highlighting, folding and extended tags Coverage of three other popularviclones --nvi, elvis, andvile-- is also included.
You'll find several valuable appendixes, including an alphabetical quick reference to bothviandexmode commands for regularviand forvim, plus an updated appendix onviand the Internet. Learning eitherviorvimis required knowledge if you use Linux or Unix, and in either case, reading this book is essential. After reading this book, the choice of editor will be obvious for you too.