Someone ask on /r/vim: What are a sane set of key bindings between i3wm? It’s good question, because all of the programs is keyboard friendly, less-mouse, navigation.
Before we look into my keybindings, you must understand why or how I use those three programs.
The key here is to trying,
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not to customize as many as keybindings, so your brain can work in other non customized environment seamlessly.
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not to use split pane on tmux, or split edit on vim. Use new window or new tab instead.
i3
The meaning of workspaces in i3 is a group of application/projects/windows. For example, my i3 workspace names are,
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net: for email and browser -
devops: for devops related tasks -
remote: for list of terminal that open SSH connection -
backend: for list of terminal that open backend project -
media: for watching movie, Spotify window -
and so on.
So the only keybindings I need are switching between workspaces and moving windows between workspaces,
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Ctrl+alt+leftto move the the left workspace, -
Ctrl+alt+rightto move to the right workspaces, -
Win+x, where x is number between 1-0, to quickly jump into workspaces; -
Win+Shift+x, to move window into workspace number x (0-9)
A sample of keybindings config in i3,
bindsym $mod+1 workspace $WS1 bindsym $mod+2 workspace $WS2 ... bindsym Mod1+Control+Left workspace prev bindsym Mod1+Control+Right workspace next ## move focused container to workspace bindsym $mod+Shift+1 move container to workspace $WS1 bindsym $mod+Shift+2 move container to workspace $WS2 ...
tmux
A single i3 workspace contains many programs (terminal, browser, etc). Each terminal must run with tmux.
For example, in the backend workspaces I have tmux session. The session name is equal with project name or remote name. Let say repo-x. Inside this session I usually open three or four tmux’s shell (or window): one shell to edit, one shell to compile and running test, and other shell for everything else.
To create a new shell, I use standard tmux keybindings: Ctrl+b+c.
To move between shell, I use
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Ctrl+pgupto switch to the right shell, and -
Ctrl+pgdownto switch to the right shell.
A sample of keybindings in tmux config would be,
bind -n C-PPage prev bind -n C-NPage next bind -n S-PPage swap-window -t -1 bind -n S-NPage swap-window -t +1
I have list of predefined session name that I can open using rofi. If session is not exist it will create one, otherwise it will attach into it (similar with tmux new -As name).
vim
I use vim with many tabs open.
Each contains one buffer.
To move to previous or next tab my keybindings are alt+[ and alt+].
Others keybindings are default.
A sample of keybindings in nvim config,
"" Shortcut to move tab to left / right.
map :tabprevious
map! :tabprevious
map :tabnext
map! :tabnext
"" ALT + {: move tab to the left
map :tabmove -1
map! :tabmove -1
"" ALT + page-down: move tab to the right
map :tabmove +1
map! :tabmove +1
Before someone complain that I use tabs wrong, I will said that you are using buffer wrong. Buffer is internal vim objects, user should not interact with it directly - listing buffer, displaying as tab, etc.