What is your favorite way to comment several lines in Vim? [closed]

Question

It happens more often than not that I have to comment several lines at once in Vim. Methods that I know are not as fast as say TextMate way to comment lines out.

What is your favorite way to do it?

I currently use:

Method 1:

• go to first char of a line and use blockwise visual mode (ctrl-v)
• go down/up until the first characters of every lines you want to comment out are selected
• use shift-i and then type your comment character (# for Ruby)
• use esc to insert the comment character to every line

Method 2:

• select lines you need to comment out using linewise visual mode (shift-v)
• type : which gives you a :'<,'> prompt which you can extend to :'<,'>s/^/#/

Method 3:

• go to the first line to be commented out
• make a bookmark for example typing mm
• go to the last line to be commented out
• type :'m,.s/^/#/

I like method 1 the most but I still hope there is a better way.

Answer 1

I think you described the most popular ways to comment code, but if you are open to use Vim Scripts, give a look to those:

• The NERD Commenter
• EnhCommentify.vim
• tComment