Executing Vim commands in a shell script
I think vim -w/W and vim -s
is what you are looking for.
The "Vim operations/key sequence" you could also record with vim -w test.keys input.file
. You could write the test.keys
too. For example, save this in the file:
ggwxjddZZ
This will do:
Move to the first line,move to the next word,delete one character,move to the next line,delete the line, andsave and quit.
With this test.keys
file, you could do:
vim -s test.keys myInput.file
Your "myInput.file" would be processed by the above operations, and saved. You could have that line in your shell script.
VimGolf is using the same way to save the user's solution.
You can script Vim via the -c
flag.
vim -c "set ff=dos" -c wq mine.mak
However that only gets you so far.
- From the commands you gave it looks like you are trying to run some normal commands. You will need to use
:normal
. e.g.:norm dd
- Writing all this on the command line is asking for trouble. I suggest you make a Vim file (e.g.
commands.vim
) and then:source
via-S
. - You probably want to get good and conformable Vim's ex commands. Take a look at
:h ex-cmd-index
So you will end up with something like this. With all your Vim commands inside of commands.vim
.
vim -S commands.vim mine.mak
You may also want to look into using sed
and/or awk
for text processing.
Alternatives
Unless you really need special Vim capabilities, you're probably better off using non-interactive tools like sed
, awk
, or Perl / Python / Ruby / your favorite scripting language here.
That said, you can use Vim non-interactively:
Silent Batch Mode
For very simple text processing (i.e. using Vim like an enhanced 'sed' or 'awk', maybe just benefitting from the enhanced regular expressions in a :substitute
command), use Ex-mode.
REM Windowscall vim -N -u NONE -n -es -S "commands.ex" "filespec"
Note: silent batch mode (:help -s-ex
) messes up the Windows console, so you may have to do a cls
to clean up after the Vim run.
# Unixvim -T dumb --noplugin -n -es -S "commands.ex" "filespec"
Attention: Vim will hang waiting for input if the "commands.ex"
file doesn't exist; better check beforehand for its existence! Alternatively, Vim can read the commands from stdin. You can also fill a new buffer with text read from stdin, and read commands from stderr if you use the -
argument.
Full Automation
For more advanced processing involving multiple windows, and real automation of Vim (where you might interact with the user or leave Vim running to let the user take over), use:
vim -N -u NONE -n -c "set nomore" -S "commands.vim" "filespec"
Here's a summary of the used arguments:
-T dumb Avoids errors in case the terminal detection goes wrong.-N -u NONE Do not load vimrc and plugins, alternatively:--noplugin Do not load plugins.-n No swapfile.-es Ex mode + silent batch mode -s-ex Attention: Must be given in that order!-S ... Source script.-c 'set nomore' Suppress the more-prompt when the screen is filled with messages or output to avoid blocking.