Neovim

05 Mar, 2026

The text editor you love to hate

Even worse for me since I use colemak so the typical way of navigating using the h, j, k, l keys are a little awkward, so I use arrow keys.

Let me go through some commands I use

First of all you can't edit when you start out, you need to hit i to do that.
Next, to get out of this insert mode, hit esc, which I have mapped to capslock 'cuz I'm a balla and ain't nobody got time for esc. Another mode (the third) is v for visual. This is cool because you can highlight text just by moving around and then yank with y.

You need to move around fast

• gg: top
• G: bottom
• 5j (or down arrow): 5 lines down
• 10k (or up arrow): 10 lines up
• 50G: line 50
• ctrl + u: page up
• ctrl + d: page down
• $: end of line
• /: search

Copy/paste/delete/undo/redo like a boss

Special note: you need to do some magic to make sure that things you copy are available to the global clipboard.

• y: yank (copy)
• yy: yank line
• 3yy: yank 3 lines
• p: paste
• x: delete single character
• dd: delete a line
• 5dw: delete 5 words
• u: undo
• ctrl + r: redo

Save and exit

• must be in command mode, so hit colon :
• :w --> save
• :wq --> save & quit
• :q! ---> quit without saving

My config

1. mkdir ~/.config/nvim
2. nvim ~/.config/nvim
3. Paste any of the below that you wish to have in your custom setup. notes are after --.

vim.opt.clipboard = "unnamedplus" -- Allows you to paste outside nvim
vim.opt.number = true          -- Shows the current line number
vim.opt.relativenumber = true  -- Shows how many lines away other lines are
vim.opt.mouse = "a"            -- Enables scrolling with your mouse wheel

#linux #terminal #tips