created October 26, 2003 · complexity basic · author leadhyena_inrandomtan · version 6.0
I'm learning Vim in order to be more competitive in online programming competitions where speed of accurate typing is a factor. This may be a basic tip for some more advanced Vim users out there. I'm very used to editors that provide prefix abbreviation expansion; for example, in jEdit I'd type FA,array,<C-ENTER> in order to make a basic for loop that scanned the array. I wanted this in Vim as well, but found that it was harder to program. When I discovered that I could use a postfix abbreviation instead of a prefix one, I realized that I really didn't need any programming, but rather a long :ab statement like this:
"this is for java, c++,c# can reshape as necessary :ab ff <Esc>^d$ifor(int i=0;i<<Esc>pi.length;i++){<CR><CR>}//end for loop over array <Esc>pi[i]<Esc>==k==k==ji<Tab>
This way, if I need a loop over the array lines[] then I would type
lines<SPACE>ff<SPACE>
and Vim would transform this into (with proper indentation):
for(int i=0;i<lines.length;i++){ <CURSOR> }//end for loop over array lines[i]
Similar abbreviations with multiple arguments could be delimited by spaces and could be yanked into multiple registers and plunked down as necessary. You could even use a similar structure to writing abbreviations in jEdit. But, this opens up possibilities for many different things, because Vim allows you to map real commands into the abbreviations, instead of just vanilla text like in jEdit.
Comments[]
Word of warning: I gave a dangerous example. abbreviations expand on any word break, so don't use just for as your abbreviation name. Use something that doesn't come up in syntax, like Xfor or qqfor.
I thought this such an interesting idea and that I like the post decision to expand I hacked together script#804. It is a quicky but might be useful.
To use it: enter input mode, type the name of your array, a space, ff, and hit enter.