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Comment by njharman | Hacker News Reader

This is by far best way I've seen to learn vim http://www.viemu.com/a_vi_vim_graphical_cheat_sheet_tutorial...

I recommend people making it their desktop background. Being "in your face" helps you remember to learn and explore things like 'ca)' rather than just hitting delete and arrow keys a bunch.

>"Can you tell me a way to switch that will not significantly reduce my productivity for the first few weeks."

Two obvious answers that came to me while reading that sentence: 1) Use it at home/off hours/for side projects/etc until you are proficient enough to do work with it. 2) Use it for 1 task a day, then 2 tasks, etc.

The "Turn everything off" is stupid way to start. [Altough it's one way to reach next level after you are basically proficient] Clue to OA, find better people to get advice from.

> I was able to get here because I used my [blah, blah, blah]

No, because you stuck it out. Like most worthwhile things Vim is not instant gratification.

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Sometimes just knowing something is possible is enough to encourage you to find out how it's done. Probably nothing beats sitting next to a vim pro and watching them slice and dice code.

I didn't have that opportunity, but a few screen casts really opened my eyes as to how far down the rabbit hole I should consider going...this one in particular is a pretty amazing example of someone with some serious keyboard AND customization chops:

http://vimeo.com/7642937

What is that refactoring tool he uses to pull code out into a separate method?

http://rope.sourceforge.net/ropevim.html supports extraction of methods.

Definitely the best. As a student, I had time to learn vim the slow, hard, purist way, and I struggled for weeks simply practicing, drilling, and tutorial-ing.

Then I picked up these cheat-sheet tutorials and WOW! Just code as usual, but in vi with the first easy cheat-sheet lying in front of you; almost no productivity hit, and you seamlessly build up the cheat-sheet 'till you know all the commands!

The only way to learn vim, I think.

I would also recommend quickly getting in the habit of using ctrl-[ instead of reaching clear over (on most keyboards) for the escape key.

Or you can remap caps-lock to escape. I know that doesn't match the whole 'vi is already everywhere (on Unix)' aspect, but it's an option.

Surely Caps Lock is already mapped to Ctrl? Then Ctrl-[ for Escape becomes easier as do all the other Ctrl combinations.

I could see hardcore vi users mapping it to Escape rather than Ctrl.

Or maybe Menu, Windows, etc. keys, on keyboards that have them.

When I tried it, I used jj as a shortcut for escape. It seemed to work well enough.

'kj' is (for me) even more natural.

I tried learning by using cheat sheets, but they don't stick because I don't go back to them for reference or if I do, I forget because I think I'll have a reference later.

Commands stuck when I saw someone else use vim, do something I didn't know about like yyp, and I asked how they did it. I'd like a video of someone using vim for real work and then explaining how they did it.

Vimcasts provides excellent, free little screencasts about Vim. (http://vimcasts.org/episodes/archive)

PeepCode also sells two screencasts about Vim that I think are quite good. (http://peepcode.com/products/smash-into-vim-i and http://peepcode.com/products/smash-into-vim-ii) Depending on how long you've been using Vim, you may find them a bit basic (especially the first), but Vim has so many nooks and crannies that you will likely pick up some things anyhow.

When I started learning vim I put that up on the wall next to me. It was a big big help.

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