Reverse a word in Vim

Question

How can I reverse a word in Vim? Preferably with a regex or normal-mode commands, but other methods are welcome too:

word => drow

Thanks for your help! PS: I'm in windows XP

Python is built in supported in my vim, but not Perl.

Answer 1

Here is another (pythonic) solution based on how this works:

:echo join(reverse(split('hello', '.\zs')), '')
olleh

If you want to replace all words in the buffer,

:%s/\(\<.\{-}\>\)/\=join(reverse(split(submatch(1), '.\zs')), '')/g

This works by first creating a list of characters in the word, which is reversed and joined back to form the word. The substitute command finds each word and then passes the word to the expressions and uses the result as replacement.

Answer 2

This Tip might help: http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Reverse_letters

It says:

Simply enable visual mode (v), highlight the characters you want inverted, and hit \is. For a single word you can use vw (or viw): viw\is

vnoremap <silent> <Leader>is :<C-U>let old_reg_a=@a<CR>
 \:let old_reg=@"<CR>
 \gv"ay
 \:let @a=substitute(@a, '.\(.*\)\@=',
 \ '\=@a[strlen(submatch(1))]', 'g')<CR>
 \gvc<C-R>a<Esc>
 \:let @a=old_reg_a<CR>
 \:let @"=old_reg<CR>

There are more solutions in the comments.