How can I move around in the Vim command line?

Question

If you're typing a command in Vim (I mean you've started with : and you're working in the bar at the bottom of the screen) is there a way to move the cursor around other than tapping the arrow keys? In particular, can you move it to the beginning, end, back n characters, or back one word?

Answer 1

Tap Ctrl + F while in command-line mode (just after : ). There you'll get command-line window which could be edited&navigated as a regular vim window (hjkl etc.).

See :h cmdline-window for details.

Answer 2

Type

:h cmdline-editing

for details. I am listing a few of the interesting non-arrow commands that do something similar to what you want.

• ctrl - B : cursor to beginning of command-line
• ctrl - E : cursor to end of command-line
• ctrl - W : delete the word before the cursor
• ctrl - U : remove all characters between the cursor position and the beginning of the line

Answer 3

To add to Maxim Kim's Answer,

In the Normal Mode ..

q: -> cmdline window for commands

q/ -> cmdline window for search forward

q? -> cmdline window for search backward

Ctrl-C or <CR> will take you out of cmdline-window

Answer 4

• ctrl + left arrow : move back a word
• ctrl + right arrow - move forward a word
• ctrl + b - back to the beginning of the line
• ctrl + e - go to the end of the line
• ctrl + w - remove one word before the cursor
• ctrl + u - remove line
• ctrl + f - if you need more editing power use ctrl + f and you will edit your command in normal mode. For example, if you want to move 5 characters to the left, use ctrl + f and then 5h .

Answer 5

nnoremap q; q: nnoremap q; q: to facilitate typing. usr_20.txt and cmdline.txt contains all useful infos.

Answer 6

You can actually add your own movement keys. For example, I use the following in my .vimrc to make moving around the command mode finger-friendly in an hjkl way (abusing the ctrl key):

 " moving aroung in command mode
 cnoremap <c-h> <left>
 cnoremap <c-j> <down>
 cnoremap <c-k> <up>
 cnoremap <c-l> <right>
 cnoremap ^     <home>
 cnoremap $     <end>

where ^ and $ are really < ctrl-^ > and < ctrl-$ > respectivelly, typed as < cv >< c-^ > and < cv >< c-$ > in the .vimrc (for some reason < c-^ > and < c-$ > won't work, at least in my setting, but the former do)