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I have made a few mappings for my personal configuration file, and I think I am getting a hang of it, however, I am wondering if there are any particular tricks to create mappings for command-line mode.

I know that there are keys like Ctrl+h for deleting the character before the cursor or Ctrl+Left for moving one WORD left, and I know how to remap these, but I am unsure what my options are when I want to make new ones. If I wanted a key (say Ctrl+_) which deletes the content of a parenthesis in insert mode, I would do this with:

imap <C-_> <C-O>dib

However, this relies on using normal mode, and I am unsure how, if possible, I could achieve something like that for command-line mode.

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  • inoremap would be more appropriate for your mapping. See :help recursive-mapping.
    – Rich
    Nov 8, 2017 at 14:10

1 Answer 1

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Vim provides a few mechanisms for inspecting the contents of the command-line (See Further Reading, below), but not many for directly manipulating it.

One way you could create the mapping you describe above would be to go via the command-line window:

:cnoremap <expr> <c-_> &cedit.'dib'.'<c-c>'

This creates an expression mapping that opens the command-line window, performs a normal mode dib and then returns to the regular command-line. The downside to this method is that it leaves the command-line window open after the mapping completes (although it no longer has focus). The window closes when you enter or cancel the command. See Mass's comment, below for a clever fix.

Your only other real option for complex cmaps is to use Ctrl-\e which allows you to replace the entire command-line with the result of an expression.

Further Reading

  • :help cmdwin
  • :help 'cedit'
  • :help c_CTRL-\_e
  • :help c_CTRL-R_=
  • :help getcmdline()
  • :help getcmdtype()
  • :help getcmdpos()
  • :help setcmdpos()
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    After <c-c> the command line window is only kind-of open; a redraw will hide it. You could force a redraw like so cnoremap <expr> <c-_> &cedit.'dib'.'<c-c><c-r>=execute("redraw")<cr>'
    – Mass
    Nov 8, 2017 at 16:51
  • @Mass Yeah, I didn't think the distinction was important enough to include in the answer. It didn't occur to me you could use the expression register to execute a :redraw, though. Clever!
    – Rich
    Nov 8, 2017 at 17:04
  • @Rich. Thanks for the answer and the pointers to where I can learn more about it. I will try to make some new mappings to get used to the command line window.
    – Kristian
    Nov 13, 2017 at 21:10

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