Select text in block-wise visual mode on each line asynchronously

Question

If I have text like this:

cat = "john"
leopard = "frank"
tiger = "josh"

and I want to select the first word of each line in block-wise visual mode, I want to be able to do something like this:

1. put cursor before first word of first line
2. hit <C-v>
3. hit j twice
4. hit w to move forward a word, selecting the first word of each line

However, this doesn't work, as vim doesn't allow each line's selection length to be of variable length. It ends up selecting an equal number of characters on each line, e.g. (removed unselected text for display purposes):

cat = "
leopard
tiger =

Is there a way to let <C-v> select text in each line asynchronously by hitting w or b to select words on each line even if they aren't the same length?

If not, is there a way to create a macro for this?

Answer 1

In general, visual block selections must be blocks (rectangles). The only "jagged" selections are when you hit <C-v>$ to select to the end of multiple lines.

However, depending on what you want to do, there are often several approaches. In this case, to copy:

" clear register A
let @a = ''
" yank all the words
global/=/normal! 0"Ayaw

Using a capital letter will append to the register instead of overwriting it.