How to select all LINES between parenthesises in VIM

Question

Say I have the following code

aaa;
bbb;
ccc void () {
    xxx;
    yyy;
}
ddd;
eee;

Now suppose my cursor is at yyy. I'd like to highlight all code between the parenthesis { and } inclusive of the complete line the brackets are on. This means the highlight will look like

before select

after select

va} is not a solution as that produces this

You want to add it as an answer? My answer is too complicated. Yours is the correct one. — bradgonesurfing, Oct 01 '19 at 12:46

Matt · Answer 1 · 2019-10-01T13:10:14.667

Effectively it should be a linewise selection. But the corresponding "text-object" forces a charwise one (so there's no difference between va{ and Va{).

However, you can make a selection linewise anytime. So va{V achieves the desired result.

I'm not sure if any mapping is needed at all. But at least ab should not be touched as it normally stands for parentheses ("()-block").

vnoremap aB aBV

Now vaB will select {}-block linewise, while va{ will do "normal" {}-block selection.

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 01 '19 at 09:08

nmap vab va{$o0

Breaking it down

vab

highlights within the brackets inclusive of the brackets. The cursor finishes at the end of the highlight.

moves the cursor to the end of the line

moves the cursor to the other end of the highlight block

moves the cursor to the start of the line

How to select all LINES between parenthesises in VIM

2 Answers2