helix-plus/book/src/usage.md

Usage

(Currently not fully documented, see the keymappings list for more.)

See tutor (accessible via hx --tutor or :tutor) for a vimtutor-like introduction.

Registers

Vim-like registers can be used to yank and store text to be pasted later. Usage is similar, with " being used to select a register:

• "ay - Yank the current selection to register a.
• "op - Paste the text in register o after the selection.

If there is a selected register before invoking a change or delete command, the selection will be stored in the register and the action will be carried out:

• "hc - Store the selection in register h and then change it (delete and enter insert mode).
• "md - Store the selection in register m and delete it.

Special Registers

Register character	Contains
/	Last search
:	Last executed command
"	Last yanked text
_	Black hole

There is no special register for copying to system clipboard, instead special commands and keybindings are provided. See the keymap for the specifics. The black hole register works as a no-op register, meaning no data will be written to / read from it.

Surround

Functionality similar to vim-surround is built into helix. The keymappings have been inspired from vim-sandwich:

• ms - Add surround characters
• mr - Replace surround characters
• md - Delete surround characters

ms acts on a selection, so select the text first and use ms<char>. mr and md work on the closest pairs found and selections are not required; use counts to act in outer pairs.

It can also act on multiple selections (yay!). For example, to change every occurrence of (use) to [use]:

• % to select the whole file
• s to split the selections on a search term
• Input use and hit Enter
• mr([ to replace the parens with square brackets

Multiple characters are currently not supported, but planned.

Syntax-tree Motions

Alt-p, Alt-o, Alt-i, and Alt-n (or Alt and arrow keys) move the primary selection according to the selection's place in the syntax tree. Let's walk through an example to get familiar with them. Many languages have a syntax like so for function calls:

func(arg1, arg2, arg3)

A function call might be parsed by tree-sitter into a tree like the following.

(call
  function: (identifier) ; func
  arguments:
    (arguments           ; (arg1, arg2, arg3)
      (identifier)       ; arg1
      (identifier)       ; arg2
      (identifier)))     ; arg3

Use :tree-sitter-subtree to view the syntax tree of the primary selection. In a more intuitive tree format:

            ┌────┐
            │call│
      ┌─────┴────┴─────┐
      │                │
┌─────▼────┐      ┌────▼────┐
│identifier│      │arguments│
│  "func"  │ ┌────┴───┬─────┴───┐
└──────────┘ │        │         │
             │        │         │
   ┌─────────▼┐  ┌────▼─────┐  ┌▼─────────┐
   │identifier│  │identifier│  │identifier│
   │  "arg1"  │  │  "arg2"  │  │  "arg3"  │
   └──────────┘  └──────────┘  └──────────┘

Say we have a selection that wraps arg1. The selection is on the arg1 leaf in the tree above.

func([arg1], arg2, arg3)

Using Alt-n would select the next sibling in the syntax tree: arg2.

func(arg1, [arg2], arg3)

While Alt-o would expand the selection to the parent node. In the tree above we can see that we would select the arguments node.

func[(arg1, arg2, arg3)]

There is also some nuanced behavior that prevents you from getting stuck on a node with no sibling. If we have a selection on arg1, Alt-p would bring us to the previous child node. Since arg1 doesn't have a sibling to its left, though, we climb the syntax tree and then take the previous selection. So Alt-p will move the selection over to the "func" identifier.

[func](arg1, arg2, arg3)

Textobjects

• ma - Select around the object (va in Vim, <alt-a> in Kakoune)
• mi - Select inside the object (vi in Vim, <alt-i> in Kakoune)

Key after mi or ma	Textobject selected
w	Word
W	WORD
p	Paragraph
(, [, ', etc	Specified surround pairs
m	Closest surround pair
f	Function
c	Class
a	Argument/parameter
o	Comment
t	Test

NOTE: f, c, etc need a tree-sitter grammar active for the current document and a special tree-sitter query file to work properly. Only some grammars currently have the query file implemented. Contributions are welcome!

Tree-sitter Textobject Based Navigation

Navigating between functions, classes, parameters, etc is made possible by leveraging tree-sitter and textobjects queries. For example to move to the next function use ]f, to move to previous class use [c, and so on.

See the unimpaired section of the keybind documentation for the full reference.

NOTE: This feature is dependent on tree-sitter based textobjects and therefore requires the corresponding query file to work properly.