Learning the vi Editor/Vim/External Scripts

Learning the vi Editor: Getting acquaintedBasic tasksMaking your work easierAdvanced tasksDetailsVi clones (VimBasic navigationModesTips and TricksUseful things for programmers to knowEnhancing VimVim on WindowsVimL Script language, Vile, BB vi)vi Reference


One of the strengths of vim is the possibility of using so called vim-scripts (addons) which can be easily installed by copy-and-pasting them into the appropriate directory. A selection of scripts can be found on the official homepage.

The following scripts can illustrate some of possibilities:

LaTeX edit

One powerfull external script is the latex-suite. It supports

  • Editing: Latex-Suite ships with a very comprehensive set of insert mode and visual mode mappings and menu items to typeset most of the LaTeX elements.
  • Compiling: You can compile the tex file from within vim.
  • Viewing: By pressing a key from within vim, the .dvi viewer is started up. You can also do forward and inverse searching on your .dvi file from within vim.
  • Folding: Latex-suite ships with the plugin SyntaxFolds.vim which is a plugin for creating "fake" syntax folds on the fly.
  • Packages: This module provides ways of customizing the menus based on which packages are being used in the current LaTeX file.
  • LaTeX help file: Latex-suite ships with the standard texinfo file translated into vim help format so that you can get help for common latex commands from within vim.
  • Dictionary: Latex-suite ships with a dictionary with over 600 LaTeX commands, which speeds up typing using the CTRL-X_d command of vim.
  • Customized Templates: Latex-suite ships with some commonly used latex templates.
  • Customized Macros: Latex-suite makes it easy to add custom macros, again with the possibility of dynamic content and automatic cursor placement.



Learning the vi Editor: Getting acquaintedBasic tasksMaking your work easierAdvanced tasksDetailsVi clones (VimBasic navigationModesTips and TricksUseful things for programmers to knowEnhancing VimVim on WindowsVimL Script language, Vile, BB vi)vi Reference