3 min read

On Applying a Macro from the CLI in Vim

November 8, 2021

Tonight I found an interesting solution to a problem where I needed to do some text manipulation on a string.

The details of the problem don’t really matter (nor do the details of the Vim macro itself), as the intention of this brief post is just to capture a way to not only apply a macro from the command line in Vim but to first define it, as well.

I have a file that contains less than 100 lines of package names, on package name per line. It looks like the following:

...
openssh-8.4.1
...

I want to change each line to rename the package to just its name, minus the version:

...
mv openssh-8.4.1 openssh
...

Clearly, there are many ways this can be accomplished. Since one of my favorite things to do in Vim is recording macros, I thought that would be a cool way to accomplish the task. However, since I’d never tried to do this from the command line, I had to do a bit of thinking and searching to come up with a solution to then capture for all eternity.

This may not be the most efficient or the most optimal or the most practical way to do this, but it’s my world and you’re just passing through.

So, let’s first have a look at what the command and its arguments look like:

$ vim +1 foo.txt -c "let @z=\"EF-y0A \<Esc>pImv \<Esc>j\" | argdo normal 100@z" -c "argdo :x"

Notes:

  • +1

    • Always open the file at the first line. This is very important as there could be Vim statements in .vimrc or elsewhere that is saving the cursor position of the file if it had been previously opened.

  • foo.txt

    • The file containing the text we want to operate on.

  • let @z=\"EF-y0A \<Esc>pImv \<Esc>j\"

    • Define the macro in the z register.

  • argdo normal 100@z

    • Apply the macro that is now located in the z register 100 times.

  • argdo :x

    • Save and close the file.

I had seen an example where it had saved and closed the file using the ZZ shortcut, however this did not work for me. I found that it would only work by chaining another command that explicitly called the :x editor command.

For completeness, here is the example that wouldn’t work for me (it would save the file but not close it):

$ vim +1 foo.txt -c "let @z=\"EF-y0A \<Esc>pImv \<Esc>j\" | argdo normal 100@z | ZZ"

Lastly, if the macro is already in one of Vim’s register, you can omit the first bit of the command that defines it:

$ vim +1 foo.txt -c "argdo normal 100@z" -c "argdo :x"

Happy Vimming!

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee