What is the best way to force yourself to master vi? [closed]

Question

First of all, you may want to pick up Vim; it has a vastly superior feature set along with everything vi has.

That said, it takes discipline to learn. If you have a job and can't afford the productivity hit (without getting fired), I'd suggest taking on a weekend project for the sole purpose of learning the editor. Keep its documentation open as you work, and be disciplined enough not to chicken out. As you learn more, become efficient and start relying on muscle memory, it won't be as hard to stick with it.

I've been using Vim for so long that I don't even think about what keys to press to search or navigate or save. And my hands never leave the keyboard. To use Vim is one of the best choices I've made in my programming career.

The first thing I'd do is lay a piece of paper or a book over your arrow keys and your ins/home/end/pgup/down keys. Those aren't needed in Vi.

Next I'd get used to hitting ctrl+[ whenever you're told to hit escape. It's much faster and you won't need to take your hands off the keyboard.

Then I'd watch my screencasts:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcpQ7koECgk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6WCm6z5msk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPDoI7gflxM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1_CfIb-3X4

Then, just practice practice practice.

edit The reason for avoiding the arrow keys is that they slow you down. One of the largest benefits of Vim is the speed it allows you. The arrow keys also prevent you from really embracing the modal nature, which is very powerful when mastered.

Step 0: learn to touch type. Seriously - if your fingers don't know where the keys are then vim is going to be a pain. And even if you reject vim, touch typing will improve your programming (ask Steve Yegge ) by making the mind to monitor link friction free. There is a lot of software that can help you improve your typing.

Step 1: use vimtutor to get you started. It is in gvim (under the help menu I think) or you can just type 'vimtutor' at the command line. It will take 30-45 minutes of your time and then your fingers will know the basics of vi/vim and you should be able to edit files without wanting to hurl your keyboard out of the window.

Step 2: use vim everywhere. See this question for tips and links for using vim and vi key bindings at the command line, from your web browser, for composing emails, in your IDE ... You need to use vim to embed the key bindings in your muscle memory.

Step 3: learn more about vim. You will only have scratched the surface with vimtutor. You can watch this video or read this article (both about the "Seven habits of effective text editing". You can read about tips and tricks on StackOverflow. You can browse vimtips. Learn a litle often would be my advice - there is so much out there that sticking to bite-size chunks will be the best way to make the knowledge stick.

Step 4: Profit :)

I've been a on-again, off-again user of vim throughout the years (doing the occasional sys admin job). I just recently started spending more time doing my programming work in it. I'd suggest starting with gvim too. It integrates well with most OS environments, and (even better), you can fall back to the mouse when you need to :).

To get going with vim, run through the vimtutor (bundled with gVim) once or twice (takes an hour or so). I can't overstate how helpful it was for me! Especially the first parts about the different ways to move through a document, and how edit actions are recorded with motion commands, etc, etc. After that, things will be MUCH clearer.

Then, start doing quick, minor edits with it (notepad-replacement stuff) 'till you are comfortable enough to do useful editing at a rapid clip. Then try doing your day-to-day work in it. You'll find yourself pining for the "repeat last action" command in other editors in no time!

You asked for good tips to help get past the learning curve on the vi text editor. Many of the previous answers suggest you use no other editors. I think that is good advice. Switching to vi from a more graphical editor requires a change in mindset. It requires thinking in terms of commands, rather than visual changes.

I used nothing but vi for many years and believe the only way you can be productive is to memorize the commands you regularly use. The way I did this was to make a short list of the most common keyboard commands. I grouped and color-coded these commands by function, i.e. Moving the Cursor, Editing, Searching, etc. I was careful to only include the most commonly used commands I did not know. The idea is to create a quick reference that is also an aid in memorization – not to replace the available help screens. Then I printed this list and taped it to the wall behind my monitor so I could see it easily. (The graphical cheat sheets you mentioned might work better for some, but are probably a better reference source than a memorization tool.)

Here's the key. As I became comfortable with one of the commands, I drew a line through it with a pencil. I could still see it if I needed it, but it was symbolic to me that I had mastered that command. That gave me confidence and motivation as I could see regular progress. Once I had most of them crossed off, I removed them and added some of the more rarely used commands. I continued this process until I was satisfied with my command of vi. I knew I had reached that point when I realized I had not crossed off any commands or even looked at the list in a long time.

A couple years ago I had need to work on a UNIX platform where vi was the only editor available. I bought a little pocket reference book on vi, but hardly used it. I ended up making lists and posting them on the wall as I did the first time I used vi. By the end of the first week, I was very comfortable even though it had been five years since I had used vi.