This is an old revision of the document!

VIM - Abbreviations

VIM allows abbreviations to be set.

The Basics

Abbreviations can be assigned with the command :ab[breviate].

:ab Lunix Linux
:ab hapy happy
:ab hte the
:ab BTC The Big Cat
:ab myemail someemail@somewhere.com

To have abbreviations only work whilst in insert mode use :iabbrev:

:iabbrev [<expr>] [<buffer>] {abbreviation} {expansion}
 
:iabbrev Lunix Linux

NOTE:

Anything inside a [] is optional.
<expr> means that you could use a vimscript expression to create the expansion.
<buffer> means that it only applies to the current buffer.
abbreviation is the thing you type and that will be replaced by the expansion.

NOTE: The words will be automatically corrected just after you typed them.

WARNING: Be careful with the abbreviations that are set, as they may prevent using a term for another purpose.

For example, an entry for BTC might want to be entered without expanding into the separate words.

To avoid expansion in insert mode, type CTRL-V after the last character of the abbreviation (on Windows, type CTRL-Q instead of CTRL-V).

:iabbrev <buffer> con@ console.log();<Left><Left>

Abbreviations can also be set in autocommands to make file specific abbreviations automatically.

If you put something like this in your .vimrc.

:autocmd FileType html,javascript,typescript,vue
  \ :iabbrev <buffer> some-abbreviation some-expansion

NOTE: It would make some-abbreviation available to you in html, javascript, typescript and vue files.

:abclear