14

Imagine you want to quote the word below. If | is the cursor position you can easily quote the word with cw""<Esc>P from Normal mode.

|below

I want to achieve the same behaviour in Command-line mode. My question is how can I say to the Command-line mode that I want to type an <Esc>. I tried :norm cw""<Esc>P and some other variations but I just get ""<Esc>P instead of "below".

Still related to this I would like to know how can I make Command-line mode type Ctrl commands. For example I could quote the aforementioned word with cw"<C-r>""<Esc> instead. But then I would need Command-line to type <C-r> for me. How can I do this?

Improve this question
1
  • 1
    Just like there is <C-x><C-e> in readline to edit the command-line in $EDITOR, you have <C-f> in Vim to open the command-line window. See :help cmdline-window.
    – romainl
    Commented Mar 22, 2015 at 18:09

3 Answers 3

Reset to default
13

<C-v> is what you are looking for. It allows you to enter literal characters (e.g., a literal Esc instead of the string "Esc") without requiring you to escape anything.

:norm cw""<C-v><Esc>P

displays as:

:norm cw""^[P

and will do what you want (i.e., quote the word). You can also use this with other <C-?> mappings. For example, your second request:

:norm cw"<C-v><C-r>""

displays as:

:norm cw"^R""

And will result in the same as the above. There's no need to include the extra Esc at the end.

Improve this answer
11

This is because special keys like <Esc> are not translated in normal commands, and are treated like you pressed <Esc>. To remedy this, you can use an exec command. Like so:

:exec "norm cw\"\"\<Esc>P"

Note that you must put a backslash before the quotes and the <Esc>, and using single quotes instead of double quotes will not work.

Improve this answer
3
  • Does this work for Ctrl commands too? How should I write them in the command?
    – Gonçalo Ribeiro
    Commented Mar 22, 2015 at 17:05
  • Yes, it should work. You can write them like so: "\<C-{insert key}>"
    – EvergreenTree
    Commented Mar 22, 2015 at 17:58
  • Thanks for that last remark! I almost got there myself, and this was the final missing piece. :exe "normal \<C-A>", very useful in a script.
    – ulidtko
    Commented Jul 15, 2022 at 16:58
2

Command-line mode is different; you cannot use the same (normal mode) editing commands there. You can find a list of commands at :help c_CTRL-V.

Now, there's the command-line window (:help command-line-window), which can be entered via q: from normal- and <C-F> from command-line mode. In that window, you can use all normal commands and mappings, so that would be option 1.

Option 2 is special mappings for command-line mode. As I said, you cannot use the approach via :normal et al. Key to defining those is the :help c_CTRL-\_e mapping, which "evaluate[s] {expr} and replace[s] the whole command line with the result." Here's a simple example that only works correctly at the end of the command-line:

:cnoremap <F1> <C-\>esubstitute(getcmdline(), '\w\+$', '"&"', '')<CR>
Improve this answer
1
  • 1
    I don't think the OP meant to create mapping for the command line, but to execute a mapping from the command line.
    – EvergreenTree
    Commented Mar 22, 2015 at 18:50

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge you have read our privacy policy.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.