🧠 Vim Training Guide 🚀 Sessions 1 & 2 – Core Navigation & Editing Skills

This guide helps you master Vim step by step with hands-on exercises. Follow actively inside nvim for best results.

📘 SESSION 1: Basics Modes, Movement, Insert, Save/Quit 📌 Exercise 1: Moving Around

Use:

h ← left j ↓ down k ↑ up l → right * * *

---

  *         *

👉 Land on each * without arrow keys.

✍️ Exercise 2: Insert Mode

Steps:

Move with h/j/k/l Press i Type text Press Esc The capital of India is _____. Neovim is a modern version of _____. The four main modes are Normal, Insert, Visual, and _____. The key 'j' moves the cursor . To save a file, type : in command mode. ⌨️ Exercise 3: Insert Variants Use 'A' to append text at the END of this line --> <-- Use 'I' to insert text at the START of this line Use 'o' to open a new line BELOW this line Use 'O' to open a new line ABOVE this line Use 'a' to append text AFTER the cursor on this line 💾 Exercise 4: Save & Quit Command Action :w Save :q Quit :wq Save & Quit :q! Force Quit ZZ Save & Quit ZQ Quit without saving nvim session1_practice.txt 👀 Exercise 5: Modes Mode Indicator Insert -- INSERT -- Visual -- VISUAL -- Normal (none)

Practice:

i → Esc → a → Esc → o → Esc → I → Esc → A → Esc → O → Esc 🧭 Exercise 6: Golden Rule

Always return to NORMAL mode.

Normal = Control Insert = Typing Visual = Selecting Command = Executing

🎯 Spend 80% time in Normal mode

📗 SESSION 2: Movement Mastery Word, Line, Screen Navigation 🔤 Exercise 1: Word Movement

Commands:

w → next word b → previous word e → end of word The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog near the river. 🔠 Exercise 2: word vs WORD hello-world foo.bar test_name some-thing else.more stuff w → stops at punctuation W → skips punctuation 📏 Exercise 3: Line Navigation

Commands:

0 → start of line ^ → first non-blank $ → end of line g_ → last non-blank indented line with leading spaces and trailing spaces here
another deeply indented line of code goes here this line starts at column 1 with no indentation at all here int x = 42; // notice the difference between 0 and ^

👉 Practice: 0 → ^ → $ → g_

🔢 Exercise 4: Vertical Jumps gg → top G → bottom 50G → line 50 :100 → line 100 🔁 Exercise 5: Counts one two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven twelve

Examples:

3w 5w 2b 4e 📚 Exercise 6: Paragraph Jumps { → previous paragraph } → next paragraph 🔗 Exercise 7: Bracket Matching

Use %:

function example() { if (condition) { return [1, 2, 3]; } }

array = [one, two, [nested, list], four] result = (a + b) * (c - d) 🖥️ Exercise 8: Screen Movement H → top of screen M → middle L → bottom Ctrl-d → half down Ctrl-u → half up Ctrl-f → full down Ctrl-b → full up zz → center 🔀 Exercise 9: Combo Practice apple banana cherry date elderberry fig grape honeydew kiwi lemon

Tasks:

2w → cherry 8w → kiwi 8b → back to apple $ → end 0 → start ⚡ Exercise 10: Speed Drill

Navigate WITHOUT h j k l:

The cat [TARGET] sat on the mat. The dog [TARGET] ran in the park. The bird [TARGET] flew over the trees. The fish [TARGET] swam in the pond. The horse [TARGET] galloped across the field with great [TARGET] speed and energy. 📜 Extra Lines (for jumping) line 80 line 81 ... line 100 <-- try :100 or 100G ... line 110 🎉 Progress

✅ Session 1 Completed ✅ Session 2 Completed