Tip: #578 - Specify Range with search patterns
Created: October 5, 2003 22:48 Complexity: intermediate Author: duvell Version: 6.0 Karma: 23/17 Imported from: Tip#578
I was recently using sed to pull out multi-line fields with sed when I wondered if I could specify a range using two search patterns in vim as I can in sed. Sure enough it works. I am using 6.1 and do not know if this feature is new but I suspect it has probably been around.
Here is a contrived example. Suppose I had a vim script I was editing and I want to comment out the function declaration of a function named My_func. Instead of searching for it, marking the range and then adding a comment to the start of the line, the following command will work:
- /^ *function *My_funct\>/,/^ *endfunction/s/^/" /
The range is specified by two patterns. For the start of the range I look for the line which contains function My_funct. I added the \> end of word delimeter to the pattern in case I had other functions that had names beginning with My_func.
The end of the range will be the first occurance of the second pattern, /^ *endfunction/ starting from where the first pattern was matched.
The two patterns are separated with a comma as any range would be and the command to perform on the range follows. In this case a substitution, s/^/: / but it could be any command.
This has become useful and even though I have used vim for several years this was a new discovery for me.