Add constant integer to visually selected numbers

Question

I have a file like the following : two different files were yanked one after another, and the numbers subsequently don't match anymore.

                ...   46
atom   142   option   47
atom   143   option   48       
atom    12   option    7  # There's a discontinuity in the numbers at this line
atom    13   option    8
atom    14   option    9
atom    ...

I would like to take the columns of numbers using visual-selection, and add the missing constant (in my example, for the first column, adding 132 to the last three lines would be perfect).

I don't know if regexp allow mathematical operations (otherwise I could try a macro using Ctrl-X / Ctrl-A, but it won't use visual selection anymore and I'd like to keep it).

(The expected result would be something like:)

                ...   46
atom   142   option   47
atom   143   option   48       
atom   144   option    7  # Discontinuity in the first numbers column is gone !
atom   145   option    8
atom   146   option    9
atom    ...

Answer 1

Visually select all the lines you want to increment, and do the following:

:s/\d\+/\=submatch(0) + 132

Does exactly what you describe. Visually selects a bunch of numbers, and adds a mathematical constant to each of them. If you leave of the /g flag, it will only increment the first number on each line. This uses the "expression register". To learn more, :help "= has much more useful info.

Since you mentioned trying a macro, here's what you were probably missing from your macro. Add gv to the beginning of your macro. This reselects your last visual selection. For example:

qqgv<C-a>q132@q

(Note, I don't know if this works in 7.2, and since I don't have it installed I can't test it)

Answer 2

As of Vim 7.4.754+ you can use <c-a>/<c-x> in visual mode. See :h v_CTRL-A.

However since you can not upgrade Vim you may want to look into speeddating.vim which does some visual incrementing.

There are other plugins that might work as well:

• visualinc
• visual-increment.vim

Otherwise you need to use a macro or use visual mode and then use :normal.

:norm 132<c-v><c-a>

For more help see:

:h :norm
:h v_CTRL-A

Answer 3

edit : answer posted before knowing OP had no support for the visual increment.

---

Here is a possible solution:

1. Select the last good number, 143 and yank it.
2. In visual-block (C-V), select the column under the 143 you just yanked (where you want to update the numbers).
3. p will past 143 over the entire selection.
4. Select again the pasted 143 column.
5. gC-A will increment gradually the selection, giving you overall increment.

Answer 4

A possible solution is to yank the number before and after the sequential break and let vim do the math for you.

vnoremap <C-a> :call CalculatedIncrement(@p, @o)<CR>

function! CalculatedIncrement(first, second)
   if (a:first > a:second)
      exe 'normal! '. (a:first-a:second+1) .'^A'
   else
      exe 'normal! '. (a:second-a:first+1) .'^X'
   endif
endfunction

Note that you can't just copy and paste this. You'll need to re-input ^A and ^X yourself with <C-v>+<C-A>, etc.

To use this, yank the first number into buffer p: "pyiw, and the second number into o: "oyiw. Then just visually select the lines you want to change and press Ctrl+a.