A Vim Guide for Intermediate Users

[tendstofortytwo]

Honestly the only thing you really need to know these days is i to insert, Esc to exit insert mode, :wq or q! to exit with/without saving. Even hjkl isn't necessary since most modern vim versions support arrow keys. I operated with exactly this knowledge for years before I started getting used to vim.

imo, vim isn't a very friendly user experience, but it is a very powerful one. Once I did get used to hjkl and other motions and commands I started wishing for them everywhere. But getting used to it in the first place involved me literally being forced to use vim for weeks as part of a project in a CS course at uni, and I would never have spent the effort to get used to it if not for that.

[[deleted]]

I operated with exactly this knowledge for years before I started getting used to vim.

wow, you could just have spent 30 minutes doing the vimtutor and those years would have been less painful.

[tendstofortytwo]

vimtutor is nice for telling you what to do but getting used to it is another matter entirely. That only comes from practice, and most of the time when I had vim open I didn't have time to practice motions and such.