ed Quick Reference

ex commands are also available in vi, after entering the 'command' mode via :, which is remarkably similar to ed.

Searching Modes

Enter command mode by entering a '.' (period) on a line by itself when in text mode. Enter text mode using any of 'a', 'i', etc.

Addressing

.	current line
$	last line
n	nth line
/pattern/	next match of pattern
?pattern?	previous match of pattern
+n	n lines after current line
-n	n lines previous to current line
,	equivalent to "1,$"
;	equivalent to ".,$"

Operations

'a,.!sort	sort range from mark 'a' to current line
g/^$/d	delete all empty lines
%s/.*/\U&/	change whole file to upper case
%s/.*/\L&/	change whole file to lower case