{"id":86,"date":"2014-09-14T00:00:26","date_gmt":"2014-09-13T22:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kurt.www.pinboard.jp\/blog\/?p=86"},"modified":"2014-09-06T15:08:19","modified_gmt":"2014-09-06T13:08:19","slug":"repeat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/kurt.www.pinboard.jp\/blog\/kurt\/86\/","title":{"rendered":"repeat"},"content":{"rendered":"

Time and time again people need to make the same single change in a document in multiple places. I often see people replacing things over and over again with dw i <type new word> <ESC><\/code>, spending a lot of time and making typing mistakes in the process. There is a very handy command to repeat the last change at the current position of the cursor: . Yes, just a single dot. Lots of time saved and no typing mistakes. This is one of the most worthwhile commands to remember!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
.<\/td>\nrepeat the last change at the current position<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Let’s walk through an example. In the list on the left below, after you went shopping, you want to change o todo<\/em> into x done<\/em> on all the items you bought so it looks like the list on the right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
before<\/th>\nafter<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n
\no todo: call mommy
\no todo: buy milk
\no todo: post letters
\no todo: buy meat
\no todo: buy vegetables
\no todo: checkup for car\n<\/td>\n		\no todo: call mommy
\nx done<\/b>: buy milk
\no todo: post letters
\no todo: buy meat
\nx done<\/b>: buy vegetables
\no todo: checkup for car\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n
    \n
  1. go to the first position where something needs to be changed<\/li>\n
  2. type R<\/span> to enter overwrite mode<\/li>\n
  3. type x done<\/span> to change the text<\/li>\n
  4. ESC<\/span> to exit overwrite mode<\/li>\n
  5. move to the next position where you need to make the same change<\/li>\n
  6. type .<\/span> (a single dot) to repeat the change at this position<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n



    \nThis can also be (and often is) combined with some search command. So if your list is much longer, you might prefer the following:<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. type 1G<\/span> to move to the first line of the document\n
    2. type \/buy<\/span> followed by ENTER<\/span> to search for the string buy<\/em>\n
    3. type 0<\/span> to move to the start of the current line\n
    4. type 2cw<\/span> followed by x done<\/span> followed by ESC<\/span> to change the first two words\n
    5. type jn<\/span> to move to the next line and search for the next occurrence of the string buy<\/em>\n
    6. because you did not buy meat type n<\/span> again to search for the next occurrence of the string buy<\/em>\n
    7. move to the start of the current line by typing 0<\/span>\n
    8. repeat the last change by typing .<\/span> (a single dot)\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      Time and time again people need to make the same single change in a document in multiple places. I often see people replacing things over and over again with dw i <type new word> <ESC>, spending a lot of time and making typing mistakes in the process. There is a very handy command to repeat […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[15],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/kurt.www.pinboard.jp\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/kurt.www.pinboard.jp\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/kurt.www.pinboard.jp\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kurt.www.pinboard.jp\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kurt.www.pinboard.jp\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/kurt.www.pinboard.jp\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":115,"href":"http:\/\/kurt.www.pinboard.jp\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86\/revisions\/115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/kurt.www.pinboard.jp\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kurt.www.pinboard.jp\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kurt.www.pinboard.jp\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}