How to use macros or any other way to add @Column and turn the below code into snake_case from camelCase?

Question

Say that I have a java class with these fields(included only few fields, but the idea is that there could many more fields).

public class Entity {

    private String firstName;

    private String lastName;

    private String costPrice;

    private String sellingPriceForSomeItem;
}

Now I need to convert the above code to below code:

public class Entity {

    @Column(name = "first_name")
    private String firstName;

    @Column(name = "last_name")    
    private String lastName;

    @Column(name = "cost_price")
    private String costPrice;

    @Column(name = "selling_price_for_some_item")
    private String sellingPriceForSomeItem;
}

Can we use macros to do this? Now in the above class, you see only 4 fields, but say that I have 100 such fields and I want to use some vi/vim way to speed up this process? How would one go about solving this? I am fine if we are unable to get the last field to work(i.e., fields with more than one camelCase word in it like sellingPriceForSomeItem).

Answer 1

It can be done with a substitution with a sub-replace-expression:

:%s/\ze\(\s*\)private \w\+ \(\w\+\)/\=submatch(1).'@Column(name="'.substitute(submatch(2), '\u', '_\l&', 'g').'");'."\r"

For more help see:

:h :s
:h sub-replace-expression
:h \zs
:h submatch()
:h substitute()
:h /\u
:h sub-replace-special
:h s/\l

Answer 2

Yet another solution

g/^\s*private/copy. | normal! -2dwdw"_C@Column(name = "^R=substitute(@-, '\(\l\)\(\u\)', '\1_\l\2', 'g')^M")

An explanation:

g/^\s*private/...           for all lines starting with "<spaces>private"
    copy. | normal! ...     make a copy of the current line then enter normal mode command
    -2dwdw"_C               up one line on first non-blank char; delete 2 words;
                            then delete one word putting it into register "minus";
                            then delete remaining part (i.e. semicolon)
                            and enter insert mode
    @Column(name = "^R=...^M") The new text with a computed part (note: ^R and ^M
                               must be entered as ^V^R and ^V^M respectively)
    substitute(@-, ...)     value of register "minus" from camelCase to snake_case

Answer 3

If you'd accept a solution that requires a Vim plug-in (specifically for the snake case coercion), then I could recommend one that involves recording a macro to process each line.

In particular, you would have to install plug-in vim-abolish, which includes a cr operation to do case coersion, in particular crs (or equivalently cr_) for snake_case.

So you could record a macro to process a specific line with:

• qq: Record macro @q.
• YP: Yank current line and put it above the current line. This duplicates the current line and leaves you at the top line.
• $: Move to the end of the line, cursor will be on top of the ;.
• s ") Esc: Replace the ; with a ") which is what you want at the end of the line.
• B: Move to the start of the word, this should be the field name.
• crs: This is the vim-abolish command to convert case to snake_case.
• c^ @Column(name = " Esc: Changes from the beginning of the line (^) until the beginning of the field name, and insert the @Column contents you wanted to insert.
• q: Stop recording the macro.

At this point, you can move the cursor to the next line (if you're using a search such as /private or /String then you can use n, actually nn to skip the current match; otherwise use a 3j for three lines down, or a similar motion), then replay the macro using @q. The second time you repeat it, you can simply use @@, which repeats the last macro that was executed (@q in this case.)

Or you can use a :g command as well:

:g/private/norm @q

This will execute the @q macro on every line that matches the /private search.