Real Vim ninjas count every keystroke - do you?

Pick a challenge, fire up Vim, and show us what you got.

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$ gem install vimgolf
$ vimgolf setup
$ vimgolf put [challenge ID]

Played Challenges

Simple, Practical, and Common - 33724 entries

Simple things we do all the time should be able to be done with very few keystrokes, but sometimes I find something I need to do makes me go, "There MUST be a better way." This challenge is just a simple movement and entering text at a certain place.

  • Best score: 22
  • Best player score: 31
  • Position: #5603 / 7442
  • Number of attempts: 2
Swap values - 4643 entries

Well, swap the values...

  • Best score: 11
  • Best player score: 19
  • Position: #1166 / 1274
  • Number of attempts: 2
One number per line - 18755 entries

Just give me the numbers.

  • Best score: 14
  • Best player score: 40
  • Position: #3798 / 3870
  • Number of attempts: 2
V to the i - 4813 entries

Input is 99 V's. Output is 100 i's.

  • Best score: 7
  • Best player score: 9
  • Position: #1714 / 1897
  • Number of attempts: 3
Applying same text modification in several lines - 2897 entries

Remove identical text at the beginning of several lines and the closing parenthesis.

  • Best score: 12
  • Best player score: 18
  • Position: #666 / 857
  • Number of attempts: 3
Add semicolons - 10881 entries

Simply add a semicolon at the end of each line

  • Best score: 10
  • Best player score: 17
  • Position: #2561 / 3072
  • Number of attempts: 1
Com(m)a Trouble - 3875 entries

Someone was real stupid when placing his commas. Can you fix it?

  • Best score: 12
  • Best player score: 33
  • Position: #787 / 876
  • Number of attempts: 2
multiple cursor alternative - 1521 entries

from: https://www.reddit.com/r/vim/comments/6w5pfa/crosspost_from_remacs_how_would_you_do_this_in_vim/

  • Best score: 19
  • Best player score: 41
  • Position: #364 / 381
  • Number of attempts: 1
Every other line - 2915 entries

AaAaAaA

  • Best score: 12
  • Best player score: 21
  • Position: #636 / 704
  • Number of attempts: 1
Copy three lines - 2875 entries

If the site is up (by some miracle), make the text under every header identical.

  • Best score: 13
  • Best player score: 26
  • Position: #574 / 641
  • Number of attempts: 2
Search and Replace 0 - 5004 entries

Replace every instance of 'aaa' with 'xaaax'.

  • Best score: 12
  • Best player score: 16
  • Position: #1230 / 1630
  • Number of attempts: 2
Number Sort - 314 entries

sort the list of newline-separated numbers incrementally. Numbers are in the range 1 to 1000, with 500 missing

  • Best score: 9
  • Best player score: 12
  • Position: #162 / 166
  • Number of attempts: 2
comment and uncomment code inline - 1124 entries

It's very useful to be able to comment out a block of code in a quick edit. And likewise to uncomment the code. This operation often involves multi-line stanzas and even large blocks. With just line-wise navigation and insert mode this would cost you about 4 keystrokes per line. Master this hole of VimGolf and you'll quickly drop your key count in day to day Vim as well.

  • Best score: 9
  • Best player score: 27
  • Position: #319 / 323
  • Number of attempts: 2
Flip the bit - 129 entries

Change the specific 0 to a 1.

  • Best score: 8
  • Best player score: 11
  • Position: #72 / 74
  • Number of attempts: 1
Just the middle - 11484 entries

Delete the instructions at the top and bottom.

  • Best score: 7
  • Best player score: 11
  • Position: #3957 / 4209
  • Number of attempts: 3
Make HTML List - 1061 entries

Turn the comma separated list into an unordered html list.

  • Best score: 33
  • Best player score: 62
  • Position: #262 / 274
  • Number of attempts: 1
Un"finnish"ed Work - 116 entries

Replace å by a, ä by a and ö by o.

  • Best score: 14
  • Best player score: 16
  • Position: #49 / 60
  • Number of attempts: 1
Basic renumbering - 5683 entries

Renumbering Basic.

  • Best score: 11
  • Best player score: 21
  • Position: #931 / 1269
  • Number of attempts: 1
Add to end of each line... kinda - 333 entries

Visual-block mode can be used to add something to the end of each line, even if they are of differing lengths. However, what if it's not quite at the end?

  • Best score: 12
  • Best player score: 15
  • Position: #168 / 174
  • Number of attempts: 3
Fun With The Diagonal - 107 entries

change the lowercase characters on the main diagonal to uppercase

  • Best score: 11
  • Best player score: 11
  • Position: #58 / 81
  • Number of attempts: 1
Free hyphen! - 169 entries

Just like "Inner hyphens", but I'm giving you a free hyphen to play with. Will your solution be any different?

  • Best score: 9
  • Best player score: 9
  • Position: #19 / 89
  • Number of attempts: 2
Order and join - 985 entries

There's something special about the input order.

  • Best score: 10
  • Best player score: 15
  • Position: #223 / 260
  • Number of attempts: 1
comments galore - 1048 entries

Basic comment reformatting

  • Best score: 10
  • Best player score: 21
  • Position: #412 / 425
  • Number of attempts: 1
convert yml into java pojo field - 857 entries

How fast vim can create fields for java pojo i.e class declaration referring to a (simple) yml file

  • Best score: 29
  • Best player score: 41
  • Position: #217 / 227
  • Number of attempts: 1
Mirror Symmetry - 822 entries

Add backslashes.

  • Best score: 7
  • Best player score: 14
  • Position: #249 / 269
  • Number of attempts: 1
Collect List - 4305 entries

Convert to comma separated list.

  • Best score: 12
  • Best player score: 18
  • Position: #1070 / 1191
  • Number of attempts: 4
VimGolfNight - 566 entries

Based on "The name of the game".

  • Best score: 12
  • Best player score: 27
  • Position: #341 / 348
  • Number of attempts: 2
Not enough Ps - 67 entries

Different type of code

  • Best score: 13
  • Best player score: 21
  • Position: #35 / 36
  • Number of attempts: 1
I forgot quotes - 16022 entries

Oops.

  • Best score: 10
  • Best player score: 23
  • Position: #3898 / 4189
  • Number of attempts: 1
learn vim in short time - 240 entries

so happy to learn vim.because vim is awesome

  • Best score: 8
  • Best player score: 8
  • Position: #105 / 161
  • Number of attempts: 2
vim1001 - 307 entries

change number 1001 into a "vim1001 sequence". (My first challenge, hope it is not too bad... )

  • Best score: 17
  • Best player score: 32
  • Position: #100 / 110
  • Number of attempts: 2
-a-b-c- - 3216 entries

Put hyphens everywhere.

  • Best score: 13
  • Best player score: 16
  • Position: #850 / 1138
  • Number of attempts: 1
Change name of a variable - 179 entries

Replace the name of the $variable with the fastest move possible. The challenge is having a command that allow you to easily change the variable name even if its indented.

  • Best score: 9
  • Best player score: 9
  • Position: #107 / 137
  • Number of attempts: 2
Where should I put the Newline? - 881 entries

Help me put the newline.

  • Best score: 7
  • Best player score: 8
  • Position: #392 / 437
  • Number of attempts: 1
A HAPPY NEW YEAR 2014 ! - 10682 entries

A HAPPY NEW YEAR 2014 !

  • Best score: 11
  • Best player score: 14
  • Position: #2834 / 3689
  • Number of attempts: 1
Letter case trickery - 1630 entries

This file is in a downright esoteric format, consisting of hexadecimal numbers, non-hexadecimal keywords, and "Z" indicating end-of-line. Make the hexadecimal numbers lowercase.

  • Best score: 9
  • Best player score: 17
  • Position: #478 / 518
  • Number of attempts: 1
quotes inside quotes - 3165 entries

taken from tip 85 of the very good book 'Practical Vim: Edit Text at the Speed of Thought' ! I'd be interested what people use :)

  • Best score: 14
  • Best player score: 17
  • Position: #917 / 1079
  • Number of attempts: 1
abcd > a b c d - 297 entries

transform the single spaces into 4 spaces repeat for each line

  • Best score: 15
  • Best player score: 15
  • Position: #170 / 226
  • Number of attempts: 1
lamb had a little Mary - 618 entries

"Mary" and "lamb" are swapped. Unswap them. Fast as you can.

  • Best score: 16
  • Best player score: 42
  • Position: #143 / 169
  • Number of attempts: 2
SFD-ROC: vimvimvim - 1606 entries

Oh no, this line is longer than 80 chars... put each 'vim' on a new line.

  • Best score: 8
  • Best player score: 14
  • Position: #378 / 446
  • Number of attempts: 2
Vertical Limit - 2552 entries

transform a succession of one word lines to a an array of strings

  • Best score: 21
  • Best player score: 27
  • Position: #555 / 757
  • Number of attempts: 2
replacing each line of a block selection - 3001 entries

replace each line's ../assets/js with /javascripts

  • Best score: 18
  • Best player score: 30
  • Position: #662 / 778
  • Number of attempts: 2
Append semicolon after expressions - 1056 entries

Some lines need the semicolon, some don't.

  • Best score: 11
  • Best player score: 24
  • Position: #416 / 419
  • Number of attempts: 1
Reverse and double space - 500 entries

Reverse the order of the given lines and double space everything

  • Best score: 14
  • Best player score: 35
  • Position: #195 / 199
  • Number of attempts: 1
Remove semicolons after expressions - 654 entries

A follow-up for http://vimgolf.com/challenges/4fc9d767d3a0d4000100000e.

  • Best score: 6
  • Best player score: 10
  • Position: #251 / 263
  • Number of attempts: 2
The meaning - 575 entries

Numbers are fun!

  • Best score: 5
  • Best player score: 5
  • Position: #280 / 363
  • Number of attempts: 1
Replacing some words - 428 entries

How fast could it be?

  • Best score: 17
  • Best player score: 40
  • Position: #138 / 151
  • Number of attempts: 1
Make it more readable - 2009 entries

Insert blank lines to make it more organized and readable

  • Best score: 13
  • Best player score: 18
  • Position: #540 / 652
  • Number of attempts: 2
The holy-grail may help - 377 entries

Can you find it in less than 20 strokes, Arthur?

  • Best score: 16
  • Best player score: 17
  • Position: #187 / 212
  • Number of attempts: 3
Shebangs for all - 2018 entries

We've all seen or used a shebang once or twice. Ditch the specific paths and leave just a dynamic Ruby and Python bath behind.

  • Best score: 11
  • Best player score: 26
  • Position: #495 / 519
  • Number of attempts: 2
A Simple One - 1057 entries

Here is a very simple one - just to illustrate/introduce a vim feature that some people seem to miss...

  • Best score: 9
  • Best player score: 9
  • Position: #477 / 667
  • Number of attempts: 1
82 bottles of beer on the wall - 313 entries

Take them down. (sorry, only 82 bottles because the problem size is limited!)

  • Best score: 106
  • Best player score: 174
  • Position: #132 / 146
  • Number of attempts: 1
Reverse Simple Deletion - 854 entries

You did the simple deletion, now reverse it.

  • Best score: 11
  • Best player score: 16
  • Position: #439 / 460
  • Number of attempts: 1
Increment, increment, increment.... - 692 entries

Vim likes macros

  • Best score: 10
  • Best player score: 12
  • Position: #350 / 410
  • Number of attempts: 2
Indentation - 550 entries

Indent each line according to the right number of spaces it needs.

  • Best score: 20
  • Best player score: 42
  • Position: #159 / 180
  • Number of attempts: 1
Context insensitive completion 0 - 585 entries

Buried in the lines you're not supposed to add is the line "Add this line!" Add that line to the top of the file.

  • Best score: 6
  • Best player score: 9
  • Position: #208 / 248
  • Number of attempts: 1
Simple text editing with Vim - 12994 entries

Make the pairs of lines match up by making each second line same as first

  • Best score: 13
  • Best player score: 29
  • Position: #3401 / 3738
  • Number of attempts: 1
Brent Woo
Twitter:

Linguistics PhD student at UW: idioms, coordination, experimental syntax, Slavic. he/him

entered into 57 challenges

contributed 0 challenges