I would really like it if the VIM cursor in normal mode could act like it does in insert mode: a line between two characters. So for example:
- Typing vd would have no effect because nothing was selected
- p and P would be the same
- i and a would be the same
Has anything like this been done? I haven't been able to find it.
just for fun, here's how you could achieve your desired behaviour for the examples you provided:
set selection=exclusive
set virtualedit+=onemore
" this is just a crude proof of concept with theoretically addressable weak points
nnoremap vd <Nop>
noremap p P
noremap a i
" make i<Esc> not move the cursor
inoremap <Esc> <Right><Esc>
But I hardly see the point. Care to explain why you want this? E.g. how is vd relevant and why not just use i and never a?
vd isn't terribly relevant ;) but it would be nice if some vim "sentences" could be reordered like dw -> vwd, etc, which won't work because vwd grabs one char too many. Also trying to visually select the space between { and } when } is in the first column is tricky.
dw and vwd do the same for me within a line. On a line's last word they are different, which seems useful to me. There, you could replicate dw's behaviour with ved. cw act different to what one might expect (it acts like ce instead of dwi), but a fix is offered in :help cw.
Commented
Jun 18, 2011 at 11:49
{…}, indeed even indentation is discarded with vi{. You could va{ instead, but that also consumes the braces. The J command may be your (post)fix of choice here. It performs a line Join. You could :map it into your preferred use[s] of i{/a{.
Commented
Jun 18, 2011 at 11:50
vwd and dw do the same thing for you? I just tested it again to make sure I wasn't making stuff up and no, dw deletes a word and the following whitespace, whereas vwd also grabs the first char of the next word. Do you have some mapping that changes that behavior?
vim -u NONE
Commented
Jun 19, 2011 at 15:38
:set guicursor+=n:ver1
will make the cursor one pixel thin, so you can still visually distinguish Normal from Insert mode by it. If you want it to look exactly like Insert mode:
:se gcr+=n:ver25
:help guicursor(link) gives you this:
This option tells Vim what the cursor should look like in different
modes.
http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Configuring_the_cursor has a great tutorial on the topic.
sidenote: the cursor in vim is always at a char, not 'in-between'. it just looks 'in-between' since it is a small vertical bar, bound to the left side of the char.
For gnome version>3.15
Add this to your ~/.vimrc.
if has("autocmd")
au VimEnter,InsertLeave * silent execute '!echo -ne "\e[2 q"' | redraw!
au InsertEnter,InsertChange *
\ if v:insertmode == 'i' |
\ silent execute '!echo -ne "\e[6 q"' | redraw! |
\ elseif v:insertmode == 'r' |
\ silent execute '!echo -ne "\e[4 q"' | redraw! |
\ endif
au VimLeave * silent execute '!echo -ne "\e[ q"' | redraw!
endif
You will get a block cursor in normal mode and a thin one in insert mode.
vimway of handling cursors is better? To really qualify as better it should be better for a beginner who has not learned to be accustomed to one approach or the other, so arguing from users habits is not valid. Also, it should be better in a case where you were designing a new editor from scratch, so the fact that it would changevim's behavior doesn't carry weight. I can't see how it's better but I'm open to being shown how.