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I learn by watching and following along with examples, so the following YouTube videos are the ones that I've found the most useful:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71YTkxUNwmg <--Covers the basics and helpful commands. I had never used vim before watching this video, and now I'm reasonably competent at basic text editing.

I needed to do find and replace on a short story I'm working on (changed a character's name), and I found this one helpful: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1_CfIb-3X4

I wanted to understand/use the .vimrc file, so I googled until I hit this one, which I found quite informative: [UPDATE: put in the wrong link, serves me right for picking the last history item with .vimrc in it instead of watching it. The actual video I found helpful was this one of a guy showing his .vimrc file and what various things in it do: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZuy4gBghho]

Lastly, once you're comfortable using it, try going into command mode and typing Shift-a, and notice that it moves your cursor to the end of the line and puts you in insert mode. I saw this tip on HN awhile back, and I hadn't seen it in any basic tutorials, but it is the single most useful command I've come across.



Shift+I moves your cursor to the start of the line, and enters insert mode, too.




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