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Comment by gfodor | Hacker News Reader

Another important vim tip for me that wasn't in there and might be one for the author himself: you can use ctrl-C or ctrl-[ instead of ESC to exit insert mode. This, combined with re-mapping capslock to control, is a big, big win.

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Ctrl-c and ctrl-[ are not the same. There are times when latter completes the insert session (same as esc) while the former aborts it, e.g. visual block insertion with (ctrl-v jjjj I)

Also, the happy haacking keyboard already puts control in its proper place and puts esc where ~ normally is, which is close enough that you don't really need to remap it. Best vim keyboard ever.

It's more helpful to think of ctrl-[ as an analog to ESC (this also works in Emacs, irssi, etc as well IIRC). Ctrl-c just happens to work for exiting Insert mode because ctrl-c is the 'abort' command, and technically Insert mode is an operation.

Insert mode is not Vim's 'normal' mode. When you enter Insert Mode, you are basically saying, "I'm stepping out of normal mode for a bit to enter some text here." In this sense, hitting ctrl-c is telling Vim that you're aborting your insert operation. (Though I could just be talking out of my ass, and it was just bound that way as a convenience)

keyboard already puts control in its proper place and puts esc where ~ normally is, which is close enough that you don't really need to remap it

Unicomp makes a Model M that does this as well, very worthwhile if you are a vim or Emacs user: http://pckeyboards.stores.yahoo.net/linux101.html

but be sure to choose something you won't mind typing in regular non-vim contexts as well, as you'll eventually pick up a habit of hitting your <esc> equivalent pretty much whenever you stop to think. <ctrl-w> would be a horrible choice :)

It's also common to remap ii to exit insert mode, that way "i" puts you in, "ii" takes you out.

Personally, I remapped caps lock to esc, because I don't like the way the editor lags when typing an "i" after "ii" has been remapped, but Caps-->Ctrl has the additional benefit of making other Ctrl-Foo sequences easy.

  > Personally, I remapped caps lock to esc, because I don't like the
  > way the editor lags when typing an "i" after "ii"

That's the problem with mapping non-Ctrl/Alt sequences in Insert mode. Even thing like bindings that automatically insert a closing } (with auto-indent) when you type the opening { are really annoying because they are commonly bound to the sequence "{<Enter>". So when you type { without <Enter> there is a delay while it waits to see if you're going to hit <Enter>.

How would one insert the string 'ascii'?

very slowly

You can always force a literal insertion via ctrl-v. So,

asc<C-v>i<C-v>i

in insert mode.

I remapped esc to jj based on some excellent blog post I recently read and I love it. Will get the link or post how if anyone is interested.

Was it this one:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1687701

I did the same thing, based on that post.

Edit: er, maybe not that one, can't find it in the page. Could have sworn that was it though...

Probably this one: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1710702

That's where I picked it up, too :-)

Incidentally I also remap jh to write & exit insert mode (inoremap jh <ESC>:w<cr>). This turns out to be super helpful for web development, which often requires that you hop over to a browser after modifying code.

It may not have quite the same effect but

   :au FocusLost * :wa

should autosave when you switch to the browser without requiring keypresses.

Only when using gVim.

This gets annoying sometimes if you're working in an unnamed file. If you haven't saved yet, or don't intend to (just a scratch buffer or something) it throws an error every time you switch contexts.

I personally just remap capslock to ESC directly. I'm in vim a large majority of the time that I'm working, so it's a very big jump in productivity for me.

Some vim users also remap their caps lock to Esc (modify ~/.Xmodmap on linux, also doable on Windows and Mac), whereas Emacs users will probably remap their caps lock to Ctrl.

Most Vim users that I know map CapsLock to Ctrl and just use C-[ (or C-c situation permitting) for Esc

| situation permitting

Yep, that's good 'ol vim for you.

You can remap ESC to whatever you need. I prefer CTRL+s == ESC:

    inoremap <C-s> <ESC>
    vnoremap <C-s> <ESC>

I have mapped hh (jj on a QWERTY) to ESC.

Thank you!

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