Delete whitespace for a set of lines in Vim editor

text processingvim

I have some text like the following in a file:

  sample text
    some random text
            even more random text
text with no indent
 worst indention

I need to delete the empty space before each of the lines.
For one line what I do is
0dw

I can repeat the same command using . but by manually navigating to the next lines.

But is there a way to apply '0dw' to those block of lines?

I suppose there is a way using macros, but I haven't used them before. But I am willing to learn them if ther is no other choice.

Best Answer

:%s/^\s\+
" Same thing (:le = :left = left-align given range):
:%le

Learn more here at http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Remove_unwanted_spaces

If you want to do this for a particular range of lines:

:19,25s/^\s\+//

BTW, best way to start learning vim is to execute vimtutor command, it will teach you how to use Vim in Vim editor.

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Vim, context-sensitive comment/uncomment behavior

To do what you want there is really no way to get around writing a function and mapping it your preferred keys.

To get started :echo synIDattr(synID(line("."), col("."), 1), "name") will print the name of the highlight group for the current word under the cursor.

You can use that information to determine which comment style to use.

A rough example to get you started:

function! s:MyComment () range
    for i in range(a:firstline, a:lastline)
        exe "normal " . i . "gg"
        normal ^
        let stuff = synIDattr(synID(line("."), col("."), 1), "name")
        if strpart(stuff, 0, 4) == "html"
            normal I<!-- 
            normal A -->
        else
            normal I//
        endif
    endfor
endfunction
vmap <silent> . :call <SID>MyComment()<CR>

Vim: pasting lines line by line

From the command line, you could try

paste -d '\0' file1 file2 > file3

That does exactly what you want.

Visual Block mode in vim is also perfectly suited for this task. Are you sure you did it correctly? You should

Go to visual block mode
Select text and press y for yanking
Go to the other file, on the upper left corner of the to be paste data (last x) and press p.

Best Answer

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Vim, context-sensitive comment/uncomment behavior

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