Tips for search and replace in Vim

Officially this is the 'substitute command'. The syntax is as such:

:s/pattern/replacement/flags

Ranges

Any [[range]] can be used:

• s - the default range, represents the current line
• %s - every line
• any other range

Repeating

Running just :s will repeat the last substitution without the flags. :&& repeats the last substitution with flags :~ repeats the last substitute command with the same replacement (2nd arg), but with the last used search pattern (1st arg).

& repeats the last substitution without its range and flags in normal mode.

Flags

• & - use the flag(s) from the previous substitute command
• c - confirm each substitution
• g - replace all occurrences in each line (not only the first one)
• i - case-insensitive
• I - case-sensitive
• n - report the number of matches

[[vim]]