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annotate runtime/doc/usr_31.txt @ 18486:9d887cad7315
Added tag v8.1.2237 for changeset 63ee3c2b140fe1b4801389872a8e47aec19d028b
| author | Bram Moolenaar <Bram@vim.org> |
|---|---|
| date | Thu, 31 Oct 2019 20:00:04 +0100 |
| parents | 5c5908e81e93 |
| children | af69c9335223 |
| rev | line source |
|---|---|
| 13963 | 1 *usr_31.txt* For Vim version 8.1. Last change: 2007 May 08 |
| 7 | 2 |
| 3 VIM USER MANUAL - by Bram Moolenaar | |
| 4 | |
| 5 Exploiting the GUI | |
| 6 | |
| 7 | |
| 8 Vim works well in a terminal, but the GUI has a few extra items. A file | |
| 9 browser can be used for commands that use a file. A dialog to make a choice | |
| 10 between alternatives. Use keyboard shortcuts to access menu items quickly. | |
| 11 | |
| 12 |31.1| The file browser | |
| 13 |31.2| Confirmation | |
| 14 |31.3| Menu shortcuts | |
| 15 |31.4| Vim window position and size | |
| 16 |31.5| Various | |
| 17 | |
| 800 | 18 Next chapter: |usr_32.txt| The undo tree |
| 7 | 19 Previous chapter: |usr_30.txt| Editing programs |
| 20 Table of contents: |usr_toc.txt| | |
| 21 | |
| 22 ============================================================================== | |
| 23 *31.1* The file browser | |
| 24 | |
| 25 When using the File/Open... menu you get a file browser. This makes it easier | |
| 26 to find the file you want to edit. But what if you want to split a window to | |
| 27 edit another file? There is no menu entry for this. You could first use | |
| 28 Window/Split and then File/Open..., but that's more work. | |
| 29 Since you are typing most commands in Vim, opening the file browser with a | |
| 30 typed command is possible as well. To make the split command use the file | |
| 31 browser, prepend "browse": > | |
| 32 | |
| 33 :browse split | |
| 34 | |
| 35 Select a file and then the ":split" command will be executed with it. If you | |
| 36 cancel the file dialog nothing happens, the window isn't split. | |
| 37 You can also specify a file name argument. This is used to tell the file | |
| 38 browser where to start. Example: > | |
| 39 | |
| 40 :browse split /etc | |
| 41 | |
| 42 The file browser will pop up, starting in the directory "/etc". | |
| 43 | |
| 44 The ":browse" command can be prepended to just about any command that opens a | |
| 45 file. | |
| 46 If no directory is specified, Vim will decide where to start the file | |
| 47 browser. By default it uses the same directory as the last time. Thus when | |
| 48 you used ":browse split" and selected a file in "/usr/local/share", the next | |
| 49 time you use a ":browse" it will start in "/usr/local/share" again. | |
| 50 This can be changed with the 'browsedir' option. It can have one of three | |
| 51 values: | |
| 52 | |
| 53 last Use the last directory browsed (default) | |
| 54 buffer Use the same directory as the current buffer | |
| 55 current use the current directory | |
| 56 | |
| 57 For example, when you are in the directory "/usr", editing the file | |
| 58 "/usr/local/share/readme", then the command: > | |
| 59 | |
| 60 :set browsedir=buffer | |
| 61 :browse edit | |
| 62 | |
| 63 Will start the browser in "/usr/local/share". Alternatively: > | |
| 64 | |
| 65 :set browsedir=current | |
| 66 :browse edit | |
| 67 | |
| 68 Will start the browser in "/usr". | |
| 69 | |
| 70 Note: | |
| 71 To avoid using the mouse, most file browsers offer using key presses | |
| 72 to navigate. Since this is different for every system, it is not | |
| 73 explained here. Vim uses a standard browser when possible, your | |
| 74 system documentation should contain an explanation on the keyboard | |
| 75 shortcuts somewhere. | |
| 76 | |
| 77 When you are not using the GUI version, you could use the file explorer window | |
| 78 to select files like in a file browser. However, this doesn't work for the | |
| 697 | 79 ":browse" command. See |netrw-browse|. |
| 7 | 80 |
| 81 ============================================================================== | |
| 82 *31.2* Confirmation | |
| 83 | |
| 84 Vim protects you from accidentally overwriting a file and other ways to lose | |
| 85 changes. If you do something that might be a bad thing to do, Vim produces an | |
| 86 error message and suggests appending ! if you really want to do it. | |
| 87 To avoid retyping the command with the !, you can make Vim give you a | |
| 88 dialog. You can then press "OK" or "Cancel" to tell Vim what you want. | |
| 89 For example, you are editing a file and made changes to it. You start | |
| 90 editing another file with: > | |
| 91 | |
| 92 :confirm edit foo.txt | |
| 93 | |
| 94 Vim will pop up a dialog that looks something like this: | |
| 95 | |
| 96 +-----------------------------------+ | |
| 97 | | | |
| 98 | ? Save changes to "bar.txt"? | | |
| 99 | | | |
| 100 | YES NO CANCEL | | |
| 101 +-----------------------------------+ | |
| 102 | |
| 103 Now make your choice. If you do want to save the changes, select "YES". If | |
| 104 you want to lose the changes for ever: "NO". If you forgot what you were | |
| 105 doing and want to check what really changed use "CANCEL". You will be back in | |
| 106 the same file, with the changes still there. | |
| 107 | |
| 108 Just like ":browse", the ":confirm" command can be prepended to most commands | |
| 109 that edit another file. They can also be combined: > | |
| 110 | |
| 111 :confirm browse edit | |
| 112 | |
| 113 This will produce a dialog when the current buffer was changed. Then it will | |
| 114 pop up a file browser to select the file to edit. | |
| 115 | |
| 116 Note: | |
| 117 In the dialog you can use the keyboard to select the choice. | |
| 118 Typically the <Tab> key and the cursor keys change the choice. | |
| 119 Pressing <Enter> selects the choice. This depends on the system | |
| 120 though. | |
| 121 | |
| 122 When you are not using the GUI, the ":confirm" command works as well. Instead | |
| 123 of popping up a dialog, Vim will print the message at the bottom of the Vim | |
| 124 window and ask you to press a key to make a choice. > | |
| 125 | |
| 126 :confirm edit main.c | |
| 127 < Save changes to "Untitled"? ~ | |
| 128 [Y]es, (N)o, (C)ancel: ~ | |
| 129 | |
| 130 You can now press the single key for the choice. You don't have to press | |
| 131 <Enter>, unlike other typing on the command line. | |
| 132 | |
| 133 ============================================================================== | |
| 134 *31.3* Menu shortcuts | |
| 135 | |
| 136 The keyboard is used for all Vim commands. The menus provide a simple way to | |
| 137 select commands, without knowing what they are called. But you have to move | |
| 138 your hand from the keyboard and grab the mouse. | |
| 139 Menus can often be selected with keys as well. This depends on your | |
| 140 system, but most often it works this way. Use the <Alt> key in combination | |
| 141 with the underlined letter of a menu. For example, <A-w> (<Alt> and w) pops | |
| 142 up the Window menu. | |
| 143 In the Window menu, the "split" item has the p underlined. To select it, | |
| 144 let go of the <Alt> key and press p. | |
| 145 | |
| 146 After the first selection of a menu with the <Alt> key, you can use the cursor | |
| 147 keys to move through the menus. <Right> selects a submenu and <left> closes | |
| 148 it. <Esc> also closes a menu. <Enter> selects a menu item. | |
| 149 | |
| 150 There is a conflict between using the <Alt> key to select menu items, and | |
| 151 using <Alt> key combinations for mappings. The 'winaltkeys' option tells Vim | |
| 152 what it should do with the <Alt> key. | |
| 153 The default value "menu" is the smart choice: If the key combination is a | |
| 154 menu shortcut it can't be mapped. All other keys are available for mapping. | |
| 155 The value "no" doesn't use any <Alt> keys for the menus. Thus you must use | |
| 156 the mouse for the menus, and all <Alt> keys can be mapped. | |
| 157 The value "yes" means that Vim will use any <Alt> keys for the menus. Some | |
| 158 <Alt> key combinations may also do other things than selecting a menu. | |
| 159 | |
| 160 ============================================================================== | |
| 161 *31.4* Vim window position and size | |
| 162 | |
| 163 To see the current Vim window position on the screen use: > | |
| 164 | |
| 165 :winpos | |
| 166 | |
| 167 This will only work in the GUI. The output may look like this: | |
| 168 | |
| 169 Window position: X 272, Y 103 ~ | |
| 170 | |
| 171 The position is given in screen pixels. Now you can use the numbers to move | |
| 172 Vim somewhere else. For example, to move it to the left a hundred pixels: > | |
| 173 | |
| 174 :winpos 172 103 | |
| 175 < | |
| 176 Note: | |
| 177 There may be a small offset between the reported position and where | |
| 178 the window moves. This is because of the border around the window. | |
| 179 This is added by the window manager. | |
| 180 | |
| 181 You can use this command in your startup script to position the window at a | |
| 182 specific position. | |
| 183 | |
| 184 The size of the Vim window is computed in characters. Thus this depends on | |
| 185 the size of the font being used. You can see the current size with this | |
| 186 command: > | |
| 187 | |
| 188 :set lines columns | |
| 189 | |
| 190 To change the size set the 'lines' and/or 'columns' options to a new value: > | |
| 191 | |
| 192 :set lines=50 | |
| 193 :set columns=80 | |
| 194 | |
| 195 Obtaining the size works in a terminal just like in the GUI. Setting the size | |
| 196 is not possible in most terminals. | |
| 197 | |
| 198 You can start the X-Windows version of gvim with an argument to specify the | |
| 199 size and position of the window: > | |
| 200 | |
| 201 gvim -geometry {width}x{height}+{x_offset}+{y_offset} | |
| 202 | |
| 203 {width} and {height} are in characters, {x_offset} and {y_offset} are in | |
| 204 pixels. Example: > | |
| 205 | |
| 206 gvim -geometry 80x25+100+300 | |
| 207 | |
| 208 ============================================================================== | |
| 209 *31.5* Various | |
| 210 | |
| 211 You can use gvim to edit an e-mail message. In your e-mail program you must | |
| 212 select gvim to be the editor for messages. When you try that, you will | |
| 213 see that it doesn't work: The mail program thinks that editing is finished, | |
| 214 while gvim is still running! | |
| 215 What happens is that gvim disconnects from the shell it was started in. | |
| 216 That is fine when you start gvim in a terminal, so that you can do other work | |
| 217 in that terminal. But when you really want to wait for gvim to finish, you | |
| 218 must prevent it from disconnecting. The "-f" argument does this: > | |
| 219 | |
| 220 gvim -f file.txt | |
| 221 | |
| 222 The "-f" stands for foreground. Now Vim will block the shell it was started | |
| 223 in until you finish editing and exit. | |
| 224 | |
| 225 | |
| 226 DELAYED START OF THE GUI | |
| 227 | |
| 228 On Unix it's possible to first start Vim in a terminal. That's useful if you | |
| 229 do various tasks in the same shell. If you are editing a file and decide you | |
| 230 want to use the GUI after all, you can start it with: > | |
| 231 | |
| 232 :gui | |
| 233 | |
| 234 Vim will open the GUI window and no longer use the terminal. You can continue | |
| 235 using the terminal for something else. The "-f" argument is used here to run | |
| 236 the GUI in the foreground. You can also use ":gui -f". | |
| 237 | |
| 238 | |
| 239 THE GVIM STARTUP FILE | |
| 240 | |
| 241 When gvim starts, it reads the gvimrc file. That's similar to the vimrc file | |
| 242 used when starting Vim. The gvimrc file can be used for settings and commands | |
| 243 that are only to be used when the GUI is going to be started. For example, | |
| 244 you can set the 'lines' option to set a different window size: > | |
| 245 | |
| 246 :set lines=55 | |
| 247 | |
|
2033
de5a43c5eedc
Update documentation files.
Bram Moolenaar <bram@zimbu.org>
parents:
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diff
changeset
|
248 You don't want to do this in a terminal, since its size is fixed (except for |
| 7 | 249 an xterm that supports resizing). |
| 250 The gvimrc file is searched for in the same locations as the vimrc file. | |
| 1215 | 251 Normally its name is "~/.gvimrc" for Unix and "$VIM/_gvimrc" for MS-Windows. |
| 819 | 252 The $MYGVIMRC environment variable is set to it, thus you can use this command |
| 253 to edit the file, if you have one: > | |
| 254 | |
| 255 :edit $MYGVIMRC | |
| 256 < | |
| 7 | 257 If for some reason you don't want to use the normal gvimrc file, you can |
| 258 specify another one with the "-U" argument: > | |
| 259 | |
| 260 gvim -U thisrc ... | |
| 261 | |
| 262 That allows starting gvim for different kinds of editing. You could set | |
| 263 another font size, for example. | |
| 264 To completely skip reading a gvimrc file: > | |
| 265 | |
| 266 gvim -U NONE ... | |
| 267 | |
| 268 ============================================================================== | |
| 269 | |
| 800 | 270 Next chapter: |usr_32.txt| The undo tree |
| 7 | 271 |
| 14519 | 272 Copyright: see |manual-copyright| vim:tw=78:ts=8:noet:ft=help:norl: |