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Initial proposal for a Vim Comparison (#238)
* initial proposal for a Vim Comparison * use org table and add further keybindings * add undo-redo and put descriptions into one line * Various rewrites and formatting changes * add some more comparisons Co-authored-by: esrh <[email protected]>
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‎VIM_COMPARISON.org‎

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#+title: Vim Comparison
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* Intro
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Despite being another modal editing scheme, meow is not very similar
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to [[https://www.vim.org/][Vim]], but instead tends to be more like [[https://kakoune.org/][kakoune]].
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The primary difference to Vim are that there is no dedicated visual mode
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in meow, since it's essentially built into normal mode. Almost every
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movement in normal mode creates a visual selection on which some
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command can act on.
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The other main difference is that the language grammar you use in Vim is
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flipped in meow.
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In Vim, you might use something like =4w= to move 4 words forward. =4=
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acts as a quantifier, and =w= is the so called "verb." In meow, we think
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about commands the opposite way. We'd first select a single word, with
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=meow-next-word= (which, critically, both moves the point *and* creates a
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selection), and /then/ press =3= to select three more words. This process
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can be indefinitely extended. For example, if you say 2 and 6
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afterwards you select another 8 words forward.
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Once you have a selection, you can decide to execute an action
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("verb") representing what you want to do on this selection.
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In vim, to change (delete and enter insert mode) 3 words, you might
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press =c3w=. In meow, this would be =e3c= since the grammar is inverted.
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Meow has the clear advantage that when you create the selection, you
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get visual feedback on what your target selection is, and then can
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decide which verb to execute. You can choose to abort if you selected
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something wrong, or better, revert your selection to make a new
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one. In Vim on the other hand, you commit on the verb right away, then
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guess at your selection target (which is harder the more things you want
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to act on). If you mess up, you have no choice but to undo everything
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and try again.
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Since many people who want to give meow a try, come from a Vim / Evil
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background, here is an overview of typical Vim keybindings for common
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actions and how they can be achieved in meow.
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Please note that we provide only command names here, this is because
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meow has no built-in keybind set (yet?). If you decide to use the
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suggested [[https://github.com/meow-edit/meow/blob/master/KEYBINDING_QWERTY.org][QWERTY]] keybindings, you can look up the default binding to
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each command there.
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* Movement
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| Vim | Meow | Description |
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|--------------+-----------------------------------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
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| h | ~meow-left~ | character left |
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| j | ~meow-next~ | next line |
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| k | ~meow-prev~ | previous line |
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| l | ~meow-right~ | character right |
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| w | ~meow-next-word~ | next word |
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| W | ~meow-next-symbol~ | next symbol (as determined by the [[https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/elisp/Syntax-Tables.html][syntax table]]) |
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| b | ~meow-back-word~ | last word |
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| B | ~meow-back-symbol~ | last symbol |
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| e | ~meow-mark-word~ | end of word |
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| E | ~meow-mark-symbol~ | end of symbol |
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| ge | =meow-previous-word= - 1 - =meow-next-word= | end of previous word |
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| gE | =meow-previous-symbol= - 1 - =meow-next-word= | end of previous symbol |
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| 0 | ~negative-argument~ - ~meow-line~ | beginning of line |
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| 0 | ~meow-line~ - ~meow-reverse~ | beginning of line |
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| ^ | ~meow-join~ | first none whitespace character |
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| $ | ~meow-line~ | EOL |
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| f - <symbol> | ~meow-find~ - <symbol> | forward to next symbol |
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| F - <symbol> | ~negative argument~ - ~meow-find~ - <symbol> | backward to last symbol |
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| t - <symbol> | ~meow-till~ - <symbol> | till next symbol |
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| % | ~meow-block~ | jump to matching paren; not one to one replacement can jump from anywhere inside the block to end |
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| ; | ~meow-find~ / ~meow-till~ - <number> | repeat last f or t movement |
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| C-u | ~meow-page-up~ | page up |
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| C-d | ~meow-page-down~ | page down |
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| gg | ~meow-beginning-of-thing~ - b | beginning of file |
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| G | ~meow-end-of-thing~ - b | end of file |
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| :<num> | ~meow-goto-line~ | go to line number |
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| C-o | | last position in jumplist |
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| C-i | | next position in jumplist |
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* Search
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| Vim | Meow | Description |
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|-----+------------------------------------+-----------------|
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| / | ~meow-visit~ | forward forward |
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| ? | ~negative-argument~ - ~meow-visit~ | backward search |
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| n | ~meow-search~ | next match |
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| p | | last match |
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* Switch into insert mode
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| Vim | Meow | Description |
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|-----+-----------------------------+---------------------------------------------------------|
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| i | ~meow-insert~ | insert |
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| a | ~meow-append~ | append (needs ~(setq meow-use-cursor-position-hack t)~) |
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| I | ~meow-join~ - ~meow-append~ | insert before first character in line |
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| A | ~meow-line~ - ~meow-insert~ | append end of line |
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| o | ~meow-open-below~ | insert into line beneath |
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| O | ~meow-open-above~ | insert into line above |
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* Delete and go to insert mode
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| Vim | Meow | Description |
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|----------------+----------------------------+-------------------------------------------------------|
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| c <num> <noun> | <noun> <num> ~meow-change~ | change |
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| r <char> | | replace a single character and go back to normal mode |
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* Normal mode modifications
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| Vim | Meow | Description |
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|------------------+-----------------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
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| . | =meow-repeat= | repeat last command |
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| ~ (on lowercase) | C-x C-u (upcase-region) | uppercase char under cursor |
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| ~ (on uppercase) | C-x C-l (downcase-region) | lowercase char under cursor |
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| C-x | *Not implemented* see [[https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/IncrementNumber][here]] | decrement number under cursor. |
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| C-a | *Not implemented* see [[https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/IncrementNumber][here]] | increment number under cursor |
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| gUw | ~meow-word~ C-x C-u | uppercase word (works with all nouns) |
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| guw | ~meow-word~ C-x C-l | lowercase word (works with all nouns) |
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| x | ~meow-delete~ | delete under cursor |
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| D | ~meow-kill~ | delete to end of line |
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| dd | ~meow-line~ - ~meow-kill~ | delete line |
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| d <num> <noun> | <noun> <num> ~meow-kill~ | |
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| u | ~meow-undo~ | undo |
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| C-r | ~meow-cancel~ - ~meow-undo~ | redo; Emacs has a [[https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/RedoMode][different undo system]] with a stack, so to undo the undo, you do some action which has no effect and afterwards ~meow-undo~ works in the other way |
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* Macros
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Vim uses registers to store macros. Meow only has a key to start a macro and afterwards play it. When a new macro is recorded the old one will be overriden.
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The reason is that meow just wraps the [[https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/KeyboardMacros][default Emacs Macro]] behavior.
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If you want to store more than macro you can store the last recorded macro under a name with the ~kmacro-name-last-macro~ command. You can afterwards execute that command from the ~M-x~ menu.
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| Vim | Meow | Description |
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|--------------+---------------------------------------+---------------|
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| q <register> | ~meow-start-kmacro-or-insert-counter~ | start a macro |
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| q | ~meow-end-or-call-kmacro~ | stop a macro |
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| @ <register> | ~meow-end-or-call-kmacro~ | play a macro |
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* Adjectives
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Except for some cases, namely =meow-word=, =meow-line= and =meow-block=,
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meow generalizes the idea of selection in and around "things". You may
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select inside any "thing" by first calling =meow-inner-of-thing= and
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then following the onscreen prompts. Meow makes it easy to define your
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own "things" as well, all it takes is a pair of regular expressions!
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| Vim | Meow | Description |
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|--------------+---------------------------------+-------------------------|
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| <action> iw | ~meow-mark-word~ <action> | current word |
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| <action> iW | ~meow-mark-symbol~ <action> | current symbol |
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| <action> i[ | ~meow-inner-of-thing~ <action> | inside square brackets) |
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| <action> ci[ | ~meow-bounds-of-thing~ <action> | around square brackets) |
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* Command Mode Operations
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Generally there is no mode in meow similar to command mode. But there
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is Keypad Mode (entered with space) which let's you execute normal
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emacs commands without holding modifier keys. Many things done in
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command mode can be achieved via this mode and some common and useful
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examples are given here.
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| Vim | Meow | Description |
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|-----+----------------------+----------------------|
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| :w | SPC x s | (save buffer) |
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| :qa | SPC m x "kill-emacs" | close vim / emacs |
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| :wq | SPC x c | save and close emacs |
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* Vim Plugin
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| Vim | Meow | Description |
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|----------------+----------------+-------------|
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| commentary.vim | ~meow-comment~ | |
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| vim-surround | ? | |

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