VI Commands to remember

Sometimes you need to edit a file with VI. Because the file is too big for other editors. Or you just have no other editor. But if you know these basic commands, using VI is really a pleasure:

Open, save, quit

Command	Description
vi filename	open filename in VI
ZZ or :wq or :x	write changes to file and quit VI

Switching between edit mode and command mode

Command	Description
i	change to edit mode at cursor position
ESC	change to command mode

Moving the cursor

Command	Description
1234G	move cursor to line 1234
G	move cursor to end of file
12|	move cursor to column 12
/string	move cursor to first occurence of string
n	move cursor to next occurence of string

Copy & paste, delete

Command	Description
yy	copy current line into buffer
3yy	copy next 3 lines into buffer
p	paste the line(s) in the buffer into the text after the current line
D	delete the remainder of the current line
dG	delete to end of file
dd	delete the current line
3dd	delete the next three lines

Search & replace

Command	Description
s/string1/string2/	replace all occurencies of string1 with string2