Vim - Searching
Search is very common action and it is one of the actions we use most of the time. In this chapter we will see some command which will allow performing these actions effectively.
In this chapter, we will discuss following items −
- Search settings
- Search in current file
- Search in multiple files
- Search in help files
Search related settings
To perform incremental search execute following command −
:set incsearch
To highlight search execute following command −
:set hlsearch
This command will automatically highlight current matches. For instance in below image
fox word is highlighted −
To disable incremental and highlighted search execute following commands −
:set noincsearch
:set nohlsearch
Search in current file
Search in forward direction
Use following commands to perform search in forward direction −
| Sr.No |
Command & Description |
| 1 |
/<expression>
Search expression in forward direction |
| 2 |
n
Find next occurrence. This is same and find next |
| 3 |
N
Find previous occurrence. This is same as find previous |
| 4 |
//
Repeat previous forward search |
Search in backward direction
Use following commands to perform search in backward direction
| Sr.No |
Command & Description |
| 1 |
?<expression>
Search expression in backward direction |
| 2 |
n
Find previous occurrence. This is same and find previous |
| 3 |
N
Find next occurrence. This is same as find next |
| 4 |
??
Repeat previous backward search |
Search word under cursor
Place cursor under any word and execute following commands to perform search operation −
| Sr.No |
Command & Description |
| 1 |
*
Search next occurrence of current word |
| 2 |
#
Search previous occurrence of current word |
Search in multiple files
Using vimgrep command we can search <expression> in multiple files. For instance below command searches string - Jarvis in all text files.
:vimgrep Jarvis *.txt
Note that to go to next and previous occurrence we have to use following commands −
| Sr.No |
Command & Description |
| 1 |
:cn
Go to next occurrence of expression |
| 2 |
:cN
Go to previous occurrence of expression |
