4.2 Text Editor: VIM

The vi editor is the most popular and classic text editor in the Linux family. Below, are some reasons which make it a widely used editor –

  • It is available in almost all Linux Distributions

  • It works the same across different platforms and Distributions

  • It is user-friendly. Hence, millions of Linux users love it and use it for their editing needs

Nowadays, there are advanced versions of the vi editor available, and the most popular one is vim which is vi Improved. Some of the other ones are Elvis, Nvi, Nano, and Vile. It is wise to learn vi because it is feature-rich and offers endless possibilities to edit a file. (en beschikbaar op alle linux servers)

During the exam I highly suggest you use vim this will put syntax highlighting in most Linux config files, and this will make it very obvious when you made a mistake or did not finish the config.

Editing a file in vi

In vi we need to go from command (navigation) mode to insert mode, this is done with the a or i button where:

  • a = append

  • i = insert

Let’s just use append for now, navigate to the bottom of the file and let’s add some text. press shift-g
press a
Type some text that you like
Press esc
The esc moves you out of append mode back to command mode.

Saving vim Files

Now we want to save the file.

command

effect

:w

Write changes

:q

Quit file

:q!

Quit file and throw away changes

:wq!

Write Quit and force save

Type :w to save and press enter.
Then type :q to quit.
Or just type :wq to do both at the same time.

This is enough for now. However, if you want to become a VIM GENIOUS!
www.vimgenius.com

VIM is not only a text editor, it’s a full blown development tool and even in new tooling like visual studio code you can select vim as an editor.

It is an amazing tool!

PS. If you like games, try this out: vim_game