Really, vi? You sure you didn't mean, vim or gVim?
I'm gonna take a shot here and assume you ment the latter. gVim has got several ways of selecting text, the most similar to block edit in Notepad++, is conveniently also called block edit in gVim too. You start it up with Ctrlv and then select.
If you wish to "go over the blanks" as well, put this down
:set virtualedit=block
then repeat the part with Ctrlv. x cuts the selection, y yanks it (another word for copy), p pastes it. All of these have some variations on the theme. Vim really has a plethora of text manipulating features - I dare say, I don't know of any other editor that comes close to it in that respect.
Ups, just saw the other question in there as well. Typing in several lines, that is. Goes like this (one method): select the vertical column with Ctrlv, press I, type something down, press escape ... it should copy itself to all other lines as well.
Note that if you're using GVim on Windows, Ctrlv will attempt to put the system clipboard buffer by default. Ctrlq is an alternative keybinding to perform the same action on Windows.
possible duplicate of How to select a rectangular range in VIM?
– Paul – 2011-11-30T04:03:24.340Note that the visual block feature works the same for inserts too - create a vertical visual block, hit
I
, type what you want, hit Escape, and the typed entry will appear in the same place on each line. – Paul – 2011-11-30T04:08:52.7401Hi Paul, not really a duplicate. I admit a I am kind of asking two question at the same time, but my question was also about multi-line edit. – None – 2011-11-30T04:17:39.290
The visual block feature of vim is for operations on a block, including multi-line edit - this is kind of implied with vim, as that is the way it works for all operations. – Paul – 2011-11-30T04:19:32.957
2Yes. It's just that this is not mentioned in that other thread which you linked to, therefore I wouldn't say this thread is a duplicate. I pre-emptively mentioned this before this thread gets closed down. – None – 2011-11-30T04:23:20.577
1Yes, but we all need to make an effort to reduce the number of duplicates or near duplicates from the site. To zero where possible. Had you searched first, you would have found the answer to the block question, then you could have just asked just the multiline edit question (but you would have probably figured it out in exploration). You could just edit your question to make it less dupey. – Paul – 2011-11-30T04:27:59.197
Since you seem to be starting out with vi, you might want to take a look at some very useful tips & tricks here:- http://www.viemu.com/a_vi_vim_graphical_cheat_sheet_tutorial.html
– Tog – 2011-11-30T08:19:58.200@gojira "this is not mentioned in that other thread" - These are not threads, they are questions and answers. Please edit your question down to the one that isn't the duplicate. Afterwards, perhaps go up-vote the (other) question and answer(s) that are useful to you. – Ƭᴇcʜιᴇ007 – 2011-12-01T02:22:16.583
1techie007: the answer in that other thread just sucks compared to the one Jacob gave below. I don't see why I should up-vote another answer which is much worse than the one given here. – None – 2011-12-01T02:34:31.503
1@Paul - No we don't. What we need is to try to improve the quality of information available on this site. Duplicates are unrelated to quality. Often a better answer gets closed because there was already some (crappy) answer that answered the similar question. – Rook – 2011-12-01T17:28:41.323
@Idigas this is not the place for discussions, take it to meta – Paul – 2011-12-01T20:59:09.073