Jump *to* end of paragraph?

Question

I often find I want to quickly select all the characters in an aligned column, something like this:

this.p           = obj.['propery'];
this.prop        = obj.['proper'];
this.proper      = obj.['prop'];
this.property    = obj.['p'];

Say I want to select the .s with visual block selection (CtrlV). If it's not immediately obvious how many rows there are (perhaps there are more), I typically use { or } once in visual block select mode to jump the appropriate distance. However, they go one line too far; if the following line is blank the cursor move to the first column, selecting far more than I want.

Is there an equivalent to { or } which jumps to the last line in the paragraph, while maintaining the current column?

---

My question is similar to How do I move by paragraphs, but end up *in* the paragraph? but the answer given there (mapping j or k after a { or }) won't work for me; the column will be lost.

Answer 1

vnoremap <silent>x :<C-U>call cursor(line("'}")-1,col("'>"))<CR>`<1v``

Explanation:

• vnoremap <silent>x --- remap something useless in visual mode (x is the same as d)
• :<C-U> --- drop visual line range (also switches to normal mode)
• call cursor(...)<CR> --- set cursor position
  • line("'}")-1 --- the last line of the current paragraph (except if it's the last paragraph in the whole file, but it's not that important, I think; use line("'}") - empty(getline(line("'}"))) if it is)
  • col("'>") --- the end column of the visual selection
• `<1v --- restore visual mode
• `` --- jump back to the latest jump, i.e. extend selection till that cursor() position

Answer 2

I have the same frustration, and I've come up with:

vnoremap <expr> } mode()=~'\cv' ? '}' : line("'}")-line('.')-1..'j'

This remaps the } key so that it behaves normally except when in visual-block mode. In visual-block mode it jumps to the line before the next blank line (and stays in the same column).

It is an expr map, so it evaluates to a string every time it is invoked. This string becomes the mapping.

In non-block visual modes, it evaluates to }, so no change.

In block-visual mode it evaluates to #j where # is line("'}")-line('.')-1

• line("'}") line number for end of paragraph
• line('.') line number for current line
• -1 one line before

You can change the -1 to empty(getline(line("'}"))) (as per Matt's answer) to get this to work with paragraphs at the end of a file. Like this:

vnoremap <expr> } mode()=~'\cv' ? '}' : line("'}")-line('.')-empty(getline(line("'}")))..'j'