Preface

0.1. Scope of This Handbook

This book consists of twelve chapters and five appendixes, divided into three parts. Part I, is designed to get you started using vi quickly, and to follow up with advanced skills that will let you use it effectively.

The first two chapters, Chapter 1 and Chapter 2, present some simple vi commands with which you can get started. You should practice these until they are second nature. You could stop at the end of Chapter 2, having learned some elementary editing tools.

But vi is meant to do a lot more than rudimentary word processing; the variety of commands and options enables you to shortcut a lot of editing drudgery. Chapter 3, and Chapter 4, concentrate on easier ways to do tasks. During your first reading, you'll get at least an idea of what vi can do and what commands you might harness for your specific uses. Later, you can come back to these chapters for further study.

Chapter 5, Chapter 6, and Chapter 7, provide tools that help you shift more of the editing burden to the computer. They introduce you to the ex line editor underlying vi, and show you how to issue ex commands from within vi.

Part II, describes extensions to "standard" vi that are commonly available in many or all of the vi clones.

Chapter 8, covers multiwindow editing, GUI interfaces, extended regular expressions, facilities that make editing easier, and several other features.

Chapter 9, through Chapter 12, cover the various vi clonesnvi, elvis, vim, and vileshowing you how to use their extensions to vi and discussing the features that are specific to each one.

Part III, provides useful reference material.

Appendix A, lists all vi and ex commands, sorted by function.

Appendix B, is an alphabetical list of ex commands.

Appendix C, lists set command options.

Appendix D, consolidates checklists found in the book.

Appendix E, describes vi's place in the larger UNIX and Internet culture.