Hello GB friends, I’m Seven. I wanted to write an article on probabilities for certain decisions that are common in Green Blue. I’ve been playing ramp decks (mainly DKP RB), a couple of sets, and with these kind of decks relying so much on chance to draw ramp and some key cards, I believe that is key to delegate certain decisions to probability.

I like to think about a card game as you would for a chess game for the most part. There is an opening phase, in which you have to already have the lines memorized, because if you start improvising and your oponent knows the correct line you’re probably already lost, or at least on a big disadvantage; A midgame, in which you try to develop your game plan; and a late game, in which a single decision is game deciding. In card games you don’t always have the same pieces in hand, nor does your oponent, so a chess opening would more correctly relate to a matchup opening. This is really important as we want to consistently have the correct pieces for the right matchups. What I want to say with this is the less decisions you have to make before entering midgame, the most consistent you can make your gameplan. This is why the correct Altering decisions can make us have better hands and convert more games into victories.

For the most part I just want to present the data and then my conclusions as to why I decide to Alter a certain way based on the data in the end. This way you can see my interpretation of the data, which can obviously be wrong, and I invite anybody that can refute it with data to do so. I tried to double check everything that I am writing here.

Concept glosary

During this article I will use a shorthand for certain concepts that encompass groups of cards, I want to use this section to explain what those mean.

• Ramp: Ramp would include tipo and sail. We would have 8 targets for a ramp card.
• DyB: Develop your Brain.
• Clara7: Just big Clarabelle.
• Clara3: 3 cost Clarabelle. 4 targets.
• Clara1: 1 cost Clarabelle. 4 targets.
• SmolClara: The combination of both Clara3 and Clara1, for which we would have 8 targets.
• ClaraEnablers: This would include both clarabelle shift targets and donald5. As this cards enable lines where you can cheat Clara7. We have 12 targets for this group. This group will serve as a baseline to calculate the probability of at least being able to cheat out clarabelle earlier than you would normally. Which IMO is the baseline to have a decent game. Not being able to do this normally means youre at a disadvantage, so we want to at least hit one of these.
• 3UtS: When I refer to running 3 targets for Under the Sea.
• 4UtS: When I refer to running 4 targets for Under the Sea.

Altering for ramp

This has long been a discussion in the community, also for other ramp dependant decks. You normally throw everything away to have the best chance to draw back ramp after 7 new cards. The two cards that generated discussion as to why to Alter a different way were Pawpsicle and Develop your Brain. Which change the math around being able to draw the ramp we need after the Alter phase. Taking pawp out of the ecuation, there is another card that people run sometimes in GB, which is Bobby. Bobby doesn’t exactly draw you a card, but it lets you dig one card deeper. Develop allows us to dig two cards deeper.

Keeping DyB with no ramp has been the main question for x8 ramp blue decks for a while, and I was on the boat for throwing it because I thought the variance of not seeing that last extra card didn’t compensate for the two extra cards you’re seeing later, but I did the math, and it turns out it does. It’s kinda stupid to argue about this decision, as the difference is so minuscule that most of the time it won’t matter. But nonetheless, knowing that seeing two cards after shuffling is better than the extra chance that seeing 14 cards deep before shuffling gives is something that applies to most decks and is information that I will use looking forward.

This data is taken from a script that a fellow GB player made for making simulations on the Alter phase and then two turns of play, to calculate the mean for how many times depending on the situation you’re in you will draw ramp. I modified the script to run several simulations so that I could calculate Standard Deviation, to get a bit of context. The mean doesn’t always tell the full story, but variance, in this case stdev gives us a look at the inconsistency over all those simulations.

This stats are the result of a simulation where 100.000 players “played” 500 games with a determined way of playing if not finding ramp in the first seven cards. This takes into account all the different nuances that can occur, like throwing 7 can sometimes result in having a DyB, or throwing 6 but drawing into another DyB. Even with all that the stats are clear. Even though that it’s a stupidly small number, keeping DyB is always the best, it even nets smaller variance. So in about 0.55 games every 500 OTP and 0.4 games OTD, you will not find ramp if you throw away your develop as opposed to keeping it, while also being a tiny bit less consistent. Without taking variance into consideration, which only improves the odds for keeping DyB.

(script will be provided but not present in this article)

Statistics of the simulation in which we calculate how many times over the simulations we’re getting ramp back with each strategy

Cow math

Having Clarabelle 7 on board, specially shifted on 5 ink is really important for GB, for this reason we do want to maximize the chances of enabling the shiftline, or at least, being able to play donald5 to be able to play Clara next and get value with maybe MKB or YW. This decision is critical, as we’re going to see, taking an incorrect strategy in the Alter phase means you’re not going to get Clara7 on board as much as you want to. For this section and onwards, I will use hypergeometry to analyze the decisions. So we’re talking probability, not statistics.

Pre alter situations

We do not have ramp in hand

We’re going to start with a hand where we do not have ramp but we do see a Clara7. In this situation, we could think throwing 7 cards is the correct choice. Here we have to think if having Clara7 on board is critical to the game plan, which on most matchups is. So we have two options, we throw everything, and hope to find ramp and Clara7 back, or we keep the Clara7 and throw everything else. Let’s see how the probability changes with this two scenarios in mind.

Probability of drawing ramp if we keep Clara7

Now, the probability of getting a Clara7 back in hand if we throw one away is 35.2%. So the question is, do we think that even if we find ramp by throwing 7, which will make a difference in 6.1% of games, will result in a game worth playing, or will it be a nongame anyway in which we ramp into nothing and lose anyway. For me right now, I think 64.5% is still decent odds that I prefer to Keep the Clara7 and make sure we have it. As we will see later, it’s much easier to find a ClaraEnabler and at 64.5%, we have decent odds to have a normal gameplan if the ramp comes back, as opposed to possibly never being able to find a Clara7 in time until it’s too late after shuffling them back into the deck.

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We do have ramp in hand

In this situation we already have the most important piece in hand, so let’s see all the situations we can find ourselves in and see what probabilities we’re playing with.

Probability of finding Clara7 in combination with other cards while keeping ramp and throwing everything else

Probability of finding Clara7 while keeping ramp and some SmolClaras

Probability of finding Clara7 enablers if we keep ramp and Clara7 in hand

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Post alter situations

We have no Clara7 in hand

Here we’re analyzing the probability of drawing into Clara7 before the shift turn with five inks. Having a minimum of three draws OTP and a maximum of 8 with a combination of being OTD while playing Bobby, Sail and DyB.

Probability of drawing Clara7 with each consecutive draw

We have Clara7 in hand

In this situation we’re looking to, while having Clara7 in hand, being able to play her before turn 6.

Probability of drawing a SmolClara before being able to play her to be shifted with 5 ink

Probability of drawing a ClaraEnabler to at least be able to play Clara7 earlier than usual

Under the Sea after the alter phase

In this section I want to analyze some common lines in which we don’t keep UtS against Dogs while still being able to sing it later. Ranging from some of the least common to a bit less optimal one. There are a million situations we could calculate here, but I decided on this 5 to have a general idea of the differences between 3UtS and 4UtS, which I think are enough to make conclusions.

Line 1: Clara>Tipo>Baymax 2 cards deep OTP

Line 2: Bobby>Tipo>Baymax 3 cards deep OTP with Bobby or OTD organically

Line 3: Clara>Tipo>Baymax>Visions 8 cards deep OTP

Line 4: Clara>Tipo>Baymax>Visions>DyB 10 cards deep OTP

Line 5: Tipo>Donald4>Donald5 6 cards deep OTP

Conclusions

After presenting all this data, I want to elaborate on the decisions I am making based on it.

First of all, talking Develop your Brain, we know that looking at two cards after shuffling is better in terms of consistency and variance to seeing that 13th or 14th card. So what I conclude is that I am always going to keep a DyB in hand, either without ramp, or in combination with ramp, to get closer to that Clara7. It also improves your chances of drawing into your next wanted card which could be UtS or the Basil7, Hades and the likes.

When looking into getting Clara7 and her enablers, I conclude that If I already have a Clara7 in hand, even with no ramp, I prefer to keep her over the possibility of never getting her back again. There are alternative lines where you can save a matchup with no Clara7 on board, but in general I want to avoid those at all costs as when you don’t have the Clara7, the shiftlines can become completely useless, essentially having 12x Tipo in your deck which you don’t want to draw into but you’re a lot more likely to do so.

Having no Clara7 in hand leaves me with no options but never keeping shiftlines in hand unless it’s Clara3 OTP, which trades a bit of variance of having less chances to get Clara7, with the option of having the best shiftline and also drawing that extra card with her, and possibly getting that shift anyway. I would never do this if I’m OTD or in a matchup where I know Clara3 is not drawing a card. The chances of getting a ClaraEnabler after shuffling them back in is still much much better than the chances of getting Clara7 in hand, so I think based on the data that it’s always better to throw them away.

With UtS numbers, in metas where singing it is a necessity to win a big amount of your expected matchups, having 4 copies in your deck is a must. Specially because having to ink one with Tipo or losing it with an opposing Ursula2 can be game losing.

Also in general, being able to sneak in a couple of DyB to fill the curve over the game makes your wanted draws much more likely and I will want to run 4 copies of them always, specially in decks with lower card quality and almost no cards that replace themselves, in this case GB.

And with this, this article comes to an end. After paying much more attention to probability and Alters, I’ve felt like I’m having much more consistent games. Now I’m not a person that likes to grind 500 games per set, but I’ve getting good records with my last 13 games being 11-2 in the site we must not name in the Bo3 ladder, with lost games being nongames with no ramp or having unlucky games against aggro decks. I’ve been able to climb up to 1480MMR pre Bologna which sadly I was not able to attend. I definitely feel like this is THE deck for me going forward. I have no doubt that it has a huge floor to pilot it correctly and a huge ceiling which we can try to maximize paying attention to probability and statistics, and it can only improve if we get better cards printed.

I hope you have enjoyed this read and have a great Lorcana Set Championship season,

Seven.

Last time I discovered the wonderful world of QMK and keyboard firmware customization. If you remember, we went onto how important it is to feel comfortable using your keyboard, specially when it’s your work tool. I teased this post with a question that said: “could I go even smaller?”. And so, even smaller I went.

40% ortholinear keyboard

This is my new keyboard, it’s a 40% ortholinear keyboard and it’s my new daily driver. I use it for everything. Say gaming, programming, text editing… EVERYTHING

I’ve been using it for a couple of months and I’m totally used to it. There were some habits I had to change but it’s all good now.

A 40% keyboard is called like that because it’s roughly 40% the size of a full sized keyboard, those being the ones with arrows and a numpad. Many people think that going smaller means losing functionality, and while it’s what it seems like when you look at a keyboard so small it’s not true at all. There is a really good saying that goes: “On a full sized keyboard your fingers move to the keys while in a 40% keyboard the keys move towards you.” My keyboard in particular has 47 keys, and I would never thought that I’d say this but there are some keys that I’m not using. It’s not about the number of keys, it’s about how you use them. And having the possibility of programming the functionality of each key has made me realize that I need no more than a 40% keyboard.

I also have to point out that 40% keyboards don’t have to be all the same and being a 40% doesn’t mean that it has to be ortholinear. This is a photo of a keyboard that while being a 40% it’s still a staggered keyboard.

An ortholinear keyboard is one that has a grid style layout, just like the numpad in a full sized keyboard, the more popular ones are normally arranged in a 4x12 grid but you can find them in a variety of layouts.

If we take a look at the keyboard we can observe that it’s designed so that every key is at most 1 key away from your fingers resting position at the home row. The bottom row is supposed to be used mostly with the thumb, except from those keys at the end of each side. The top 3 rows are the ones that hold alphanumerics and some other mods, we’ll take a look at my layout later. The interesting part about this layout is that it gets rid of the horrendously huge spacebar and puts in more keys that can be used as new modifiers, for example, we can make the top row numerical like in a standard keyboard, we can have a numpad layer to emulate one we could have on a full sized keyboard.

Stuck in the times of typewriters

We can argue that an ortholinear keyboard is not really ergonomic by itself, and that would be true. But at the same time, being stuck on a keyboard layout invented to slow down people typing on typewriters more than a century ago isn’t the best solution either. It’s true that it’s not exactly the same layout, but the current keyboard layout is heavily influenced by the popular IBM keyboards from the 70’s that are mostly an adaptation to modern computers from typewriter layouts.

After all this time I’ve been using a 40% keyboard, typing on it feels like home. Whenever I have to go back to a full sized keyboard a lot of keys feel so far away it even hurts to try to reach them (backspace 😩).

Qwerty is also something that I feel is wrong with standard keyboards, I still type on it and I really think I should move to Colemak someday but it’s something that requires a bit of time to get back to productive levels of typing so I have yet to find some time to fully go for it.

One of the biggest downsides to standard layouts is how much work it puts on the pinkies. The pinky is the weakest finger but for some reason it’s supposed to hit the farthest keys and held modifiers for large amounts of time. Meanwhile, the strongest finger, the thumb, only has the huge space key at reach. Both thumbs for a single key is just not optimal.

Traditional keyboards have one key for each function, and that’s what it makes them have so many keys to fit every single function available. 40% keyboards on the other hand take advantage of the different ways you press a key to fit a lot more functionality on a single key. Keys either have a tap or a hold function, if you type a letter you only tap the key once and for a short amout of time. But with shift for example you have to hold the key to make it function. Taking this into account you can merge different keys into one. I myself have the space key act as a layer modifier when held and as a normal space character when tapped.

How does an ortholinear keyboard solve my problems

Right now I’m mostly happy and comfortable while using my keyboard, some of it is because I feel like I’m using a more comfortable layout but most of it is having a fully programmable keyboard. Having to adapt to a given keyboard layout is not fair because people just have different preferences, different needs. I really feel like the keyboard industry is riding a wave of stagnation and laziness regarding our daily tool. Most people don’t want to learn new ways of doing things, but it shouldn’t be the norm, or the only option.

I’m sure that if you’re a taxi driver there are a lot of cars to choose from that better fit your needs. If you’re a cook you probably have your own tools that fit your way of working… You get the point.

This keyboard isn’t necessarily the solution, but it really enables me to have a comfortable workflow while having to type at least for 8h a day.

My layout

My layout has changed a bit since my last post, but I mostly tried to port it back to the 65% keyboard. I’ll probaly make some tweaks here and there but I’m mostly sure I’m on my endgame layout. I also have to point out that I got a planck keyboard for work and have a full grid layout on it. Layout is exactly the same except I shift the backspace key to the left of the space one more key to the left, so it acts as backspace when tapping and lower when held.

We mostly have a standard qwerty layout, with a few changes to better fit my needs. I use vim as an editor so having an escape key closely available is something I like, that’s why in place of caps lock I have an escape key when tapped and a control key when held.

The tab key is a tap based key, so we can actually fit a hold based function on it. That’s where I fit my numpad layer that we will later take a look at.

The space key is also a tap based key so I put a movement layer there, it’s the last layer we will take a look at.

The bottom row corners had nothing on it so I decided to put a Hyper and a Meh key, which simulate hitting ctrl+shift+alt+gui and ctrl+shift+alt respectively without having to hit all those keys at the same time. Those key combinations are not normally used for system shortcuts so I have them assigned to change workspaces, move windows around, screenshot shortcuts… Those two keys are kinda hard to hit with pinky fingers so I instead use the edge of the palm of my hand to hit them.

The keys named MO(1) and MO(2) are usually called lower and raise respectively and are supposed to activate layers that held keys to represent numbers and symbols that are missing by not having a physical number row. I know most people have them switched to what I used but I use them this way so that I can easily hit numbers when playing games on wasd or qwer.

In my case the logic behind lower and raise was the following. The lower layer holds all the characters that in a key are normally printed on the lower part of the key. And the raise layer holds all the shifted variants of character on the lower layer, that are normally printed on the higher side of the key. To get the number 6 we would have to hit lower+y, y is the 6th key if we start counting from q. To get the caret on the other hand we would hit raise+y.

And here we have a photo of both lower and raise layers.

We can now take a look at my numpad layer, it holds a standard numpad where my right hand rests so I can use it without even having to move my hand. I have also chosen to put my F-keys in this layers as I don’t use them that much and I’m already used to their position.

And lastly we have my movement layer, this layer aims to facilitate what arrow keys normally do without having them a million kilometers away from my normal position. I’ve chosen to have the arrows vim style but you can see how useful this layer can be compared to the stardard way of using arrows.

Conclusion

This is the end of my post, hope you liked it. My interest with all of this comes from me wanting to improve my workflow and feel more comfortable in my work environment. This is not meant to bash on people using standard keyboards, just a reflexion trying to show how we have alternatives to what’s normally presented to us and to try to get people to know this world of 40% keyboards.

When I was little I remember my dad teaching me to touch type, we didn’t even have a computer at home, but my dad thought it was important for me to learn to use a keyboard and brought an old typewriter home. He had an old book that I used to practice touch typing and I remember how I spent hours typing repeatedly the same blocks of text. Eventually the typewriter went away and I got to use my dads work laptop, in which I (sometimes) cheated by copy pasting the exercises.

I’m so grateful that I got to learn to touch type so young, I can’t recall exactly, but it was around the age of 8. I got a base in touch typing, I could type quite fast for my age and I never got to develop bad habits.

What has changed since then

Fast forward to today and I’m a programmer, the keyboard is my main tool for work and coincidentally gaming is also a hobby of mine. I spend a lot of time in front of a computer. If you’re interested I average 80 wpm, it’s not ultrafast, but I think it’s good enough that I don’t feel like it’s a bottleneck.

I have changed quite a lot of things whenever I felt like something made me slow in regards to typing. First it was Vim, or modal editing, that made me realize how awesome it was to not have to move your hand away from the keyboard so much.

Then when you spend hours coding in the default spanish keyboard layout, you start to realize how it never was intended to be used for coding. For some reason you have the most useful coding characters behind third layer modifiers, and at the same time you have ñ and ç as no mod characters instead of having them behind AltGr shortcuts. I could even argue that accented vowels are occupying the precious spot of the most used characters in programming. Needless to say I moved away from that layout, I’m now using the US International layout, which has the standart US layout but you can also get special latin characters with AltGr combinations. So I still have ñ behind AltGr + n and accented vowels behind AltGr + vowel.

After this changes I got super comfortable with my typing experience inside my code editor of choice. But there was still a big problem, when I was out of Vim, say in the web browser sending an email or when I found myself in a word processor like Libre Office.

Where are my Vim bindings!

No more waiting, I’m going to go straight to the point of this post. How did I end up being at peace (not really) with my keyboard use outside of Vim? Behold my current layout:

Main layer

This is a blueprint of my keyboard configuration. The keyboard I’m using is a TADA68, which is a 65% keyboard. I don’t even make use of the arrows or the first column on the right side of the keyboard. The important part of my keyboard is that you can flash whatever configuration you want into the board. And so when you take it anywhere, say work or when traveling, you keep the key configuration as you wanted when you flashed it. This is made possible by QMK, but if you don’t have a QMK compatible keyboard you still can change things up by software.

Let me go into the why’s of my configuration:

• I used to have the Esc key where the Caps Lock key is, but now that I have the possibility, I have both Ctrl and Esc key in the Caps Lock. The key works as Esc when you tap it and as Ctrl when you hold it. This is possible thanks to Tap Dance, which is a concept introduced by the QMK firmware configuration.

• Because I now have the Esc and Ctrl in a single key I’m free to put back the Grave/Tilde key back on top of Tab. I also make use of the Ctrl position to have access to the second layer which we will take a look at later.

• The main feature of this configuration is the Space key. Which acts both as a Space when tapped and as a layer 1 access key when held. Layer 1 gives us access to some keys that enable us to not have to move our hand away from the main row while having access to every single key you can find in a full size keyboard, numpad included.

First layer

I don’t have every key configured into this layout, just the ones I use the most. There are also some keys with no resoning behind them besides being in convenient positions. The whys to this layer:

• I have hjkl as arrow keys, with this I have Vim style movement keys in every single place text input is expected at.

• As in Vim, b and e work as word wise motions backwards and forwards.

• The y key copies, acting as Ctrl + Ins which also works for the console and Emacs, unlike Ctrl + C. And on the contrary the p key pastes, acting as Shift + Ins.

• Finally we have Home and End keys in intuitive positions, also an alternative Enter key close to my index finger. The Function keys are accessible through the numbers now.

Second layer

This layer is just for convenience, but has a couple of interesting uses.

• Without moving my hand I have access to a numpad, only inconvenience is that is not ortholinear, but maybe will be soon 👀.

• Now that my Caps Lock key doesn’t actually act as intended, I have it mapped to Layer2 + c.

• I almost never use media keys but they’re there, I suppose I’ll have too look at the binding whenever I want to use it.

• Lastly I have a key to change my default layout to a gaming layout, that is one where I don’t really want to have Control at Caps Lock and also have Space acting as normal. You’ll have a screenshot below but I don’t think it needs much explanation. I just activate it whenever I need it and change it back when I finished playing.

Conclusion

I went down to a 65% keyboard and it’s been one of my biggest leaps in regards to productivity. I can’t recommend QMK firmware keyboards enough, they’re so awesome. I never knew I needed it and now I can’t go back. The amount of customization available to you is huge and everything is flashed into the keyboard, no need for software after that, just take it anywhere.

As I said before, I’m really comfortable with this configuration and it really has improved my productivity by a lot. But now I feel like there are a lot of useless keys in my keyboard. And my question is, could I go even smaller?

Links of interest

• QMK firmware webpage.
• Mechanical Keyboards’ subreddit

Well ok, I might have exagerated. I actually don’t care what text editor you use, just use the one you feel most comfortable with. What I really want to transmit with this text is that there are more ways to edit text than the traditional way, the one most people use when they learn how to use a computer.

I don’t want to make anyone feel bad with this post. This is not an editor war, neither about how you have to edit text. If you’re reading this it’s because you’re interested in learning about a concept that’s not common or you want to know what all this is about.

This is also not a tutorial about how to use Vim, I want to focus on what implies using a modal text editor and in the why, how and how not. I’m trying to give some guidance, resources and ideas so that if you’re interested in learning about it you have some preconceived knowledge about modal editing’s purpouse.

The philosophy

Modal editing was born out of the necessities programmers had back when the only way of interacting with the computer was through the command line interface. There was no mouse you could use because there even weren’t any graphical interfaces you could scroll through. This is when out of these needs people started to find a way to optimize how they edited text through the keyboard.

So well, what’s the philosophy behind modal editing? We can summarize it in a few lines, but I’ll probably forget something.

• Optimize the use of the keyboard.
• Minimize the distance our hand travels from what we call the home row. This is our keyboard’s main row, in which our hand normally rests.
• Make use of modes (this is where modal editing comes from), that change the behaviour of the different keys in our keyboard so we can make use of the specific functions our text editor gives us.
• Understand that, either writing or programming, we actually spend more time editing text than adding it, and for that reason the optimization of it should be prioritized.
• Reduce the amount of repetitive actions we perform. For this, modal editors give us macros, that really facilitates this matter.

The main caracteristic that defines the philosophy is modes. Let’s say modes are a way to differentiate introducing text from the rest of functions we make use of to edit text. If we take a look at Microsoft Word, for example, we can see that we have a main way to interact with text, while we also have some shortcuts to act on our text. We can select text with our mouse, move around with the arrow keys… All this adds up to an intuitive way to edit text, but, is it really an efficient way to do it?

How do the controls we all know translate to a modal editor?

At first glance, modal editing controls may appear unintuitive or just weird. Modal editors make us of mnemonics to try to make it intuitive for us to learn the commands. Sounds doubtful, but believe me when I say that it’s just about undertanding the logic behind it, after that, everything in modal editing follows the same principles.

I’m going to make use of Vim to explain my point, just because I think the sucessor of an edit born in the 70s that’s still relevant is a good enought reason for me to have it as a reference. And yes, Vi wasn’t the first modal editor, but it’s the one which got popular to the point that a lot of people still use it today.

Vim (Vi IMproved) tries to take Vi and improve it. Mainly they are similar, but I think it’s weird to talk about Vi having Vim available to us.

This are the modes that Vim has available to us:

• Normal mode: This mode is the main one, in normal mode we can move around the document, search for text, find characters, delete text or tell our editor which part of our text we want to modify… This mode makes use of mnemonics to assign functions to the alphanumeric keys of our keyboard, for example d for delete, p for paste, etc. To move around the document we can use h to move left, j to move down, k to move up and l to move right. Again, this may some weird but we can move around our document without even reaching for the arrows.
• Insert mode: Every person know this mode, it’s the one every modern text editor uses, where you can just type alphanumeric characters and they will appear on the screen. We still have some shortcuts available to us, but the main purpouse of this mode is just introducing text.
• Visual mode: This mode exist just for text selection, we still have the normal mode movement keys to move around and select text. This is a really powerful mode as we can make use of the searching fuctionality to move our cursor, and so select whats between our starting point and our actual cursors position.
• Visual block mode: This mode is exactly like the last one, but we can now select text in blocks, this is really useful if we want to select text separated by columns, like in data tables.
• Replace mode: I’ve actually never used this mode, it works as when you let find your insert key is turned on in Microsoft Word and just replaces text as you write. It doesn’t offer much as you probably prefer to use normal mode editing functions to replace text.

There are more modes to Vim, like command mode, ^X mode or Ex command mode, but they are much more advanced and I think it’s better not to think about them when you’re first learning Vim.

The language

I’ve been talking about modal editing for some time, but I can’t forget to talk about what makes modal editing actually be useful and intuitive. I’m talking about the Vim language, it’s what Vim uses for it’s commands or shortcuts. As I said before insert mode is the one we use to introduce text, but to make use of the magic that Vim is known for we have to take a look at normal mode. Every command is formed by three parts: a verb, a subject and optionally a movement. This makes the automation and repetition of this commands so easy. You can now use macros around this commands. Let’s take a look at some examples.

How is it possible to memorized every single Vim command, how can we, for example, delete two words? Well, we want to delete, two, words. We have delete as a verb, word as a subject and two as a movement. It’s so easy as positioning our cursor behind the first word we want to delete, and in normal mode type d2w. Is it really that easy? what does that mean? Literally delete two words. That’s how vim commands work. How can we change a word? cw (Change Word), delete an entire paragraph? dip (Delete Inside Paragraph), change the content of a quoted text? ci" (Change Inside “). We could spend the entire day listing example, but you get the point.

Why make use of modal editing?

Even though behind the philosophy there is no focus in health, it’s inherent that moving your hand and specially your wrist less, makes for a healthier typing experience. There is no real scientific study behind it but it’s well known that it can help with wrist pains derived from having to move your hand so much between your keyboard and the arrow keys or the mouse.

Speed is one of it’s main advantages. Once you learn the basic movement keys and the purpouse of the several modes available to us, every action is at most at two keys of distance of our fingers.

Learning to use modal editing is tedious, you have to change your way of thinking, a bit like when you learn to program, but when you start to have some agility it’s easy to see the benefits. In my case, I started learning Vim because I got interested in improving my speed, every travel to they mouse or arrow keys feels cumbersome and made me feel clumsy.

If I’m honest with you, I don’t think learning it is difficult at all, once you learn the main concepts it’s all about logic to keep making sense of the commands.

How not to learn about modal editing?

I’ve said Vim is not hard, yes, but it requieres a learning period. You shouldn’t force yourself to use it at work or in a project that requires to be productive, at least give it some time before you start depending on it.

You don’t actually have to use vim to learn modal editing, every decent and modernt text editor has some kind of plugin to get modal editing working for it. Visual Studio Code has one for it, start using that and maybe move towards Vim progressively.

How to actually learn about modal editing?

If you’re inclined to learn Vim you can make use of vimtutor in the console, which is a really good resource that guides you through vim while you learn about it’s controls and commands. vimtutor comes installed with vim and if you’re using any linux distro it’s probably available to you.

If you end up deciding to use emacs, which by default is not a modal editor, it’s evil packages might be helpful to you. They turn Emacs into a full fledged modal editor based on Vim controls. Emacs’ evil packages have evil-tutor, which is just a translation of vimtutor that comes with evil.

As I said before, any decent known text editor has a plugin that implements modal editing to it. Make use of that plugin. I don’t have a tutorial for each of them but you can start to try writing small texts, twitts, maybe emails or whatever motivates you to keep learning.

You can also play, yes, play! There are some simple games that make use of Vim movement keys and several others to try and make you comfortable moving around with them. There are lots of them, I recommend you this one..

One of the resources that helped me most was the ThoughtBot youtube channel, which normally upload videos of the talks they host, where some of them are about Vim and Emacs. The ones I recommend the most are “learning Vim in a week” and “How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Emacs”.

This other text comes into detail about how you can make use of vim beyond what most people know about it, in a really advanced way.

If you end up using Vim or Emacs, the posibilities this text editors offer us are inmense, they introduce a programming language interpreter that let us expand the functionalities of this editors with the only limit of our imagination. It’s also because of this that we can feel intimidated coming into this editors, they have to much to offer but also so much to learn, I recommend you learn the basics and learn little by little how you can improve your speed and functionalities that could come in handy to you.

Conclusion

This is the end of my text, if you were coming for an answer on how to get out of Vim it was :q. With this post I wanted to abstract myself from the technical questions. It’s possible that in the future I’ll write something more technical, but there are already tons of resources on how to learn Vim so you will probably have to wait.

Links of interest

• 2019 text editor popularity survey by Stack Overflow.
• The Wikipedia page of Vi, the predecessor of Vim
• Vim, the modal text editor.
• Link to my emacs config file, adapted for modal editing.
• Link to my vim config file
• Vim-adventures, a game that makes use of vim controls to teach you vim.
• A post that tries to teach us about the advanced ways we can make use of vim.