how to type certain commands in vim, like CTRL-] ^Wc etc.. on a German Keyboard

Question

I'm sitting here feeling silly - the vim help tells me to hit CTRL] (to follow links in the help) and I can't get it!? Same problem with ^Wc (close a split window)

I have a German keyboard and especially the CTRL] doesn't seem to work for me.

How do I do them?

Thanks for the help so far, seems to work except the CTRL]! Any idea how I can make it work?

Disorganize

Answer 1

I have a Croatian keyboard and pretty much the same problems (due to the fact that I don't have, for example "]" on it). Have you thought about remapping those keys to something which you could use instead of Ctrl-] key.

For example, plain enter works nicely for me.

To do that, you just go to your "/vimfiles/ftplugin/" directory, and create a file called help.vim (if you're interested in using that key combination only in HELP kind of files). In it, type

nmap <buffer> <Enter> <C-]>
"for just following the link
nmap <buffer> <C-Enter> <C-w><C-]><C-w>T
"for following the help topic in a new split (often useful)

Brewery

Answer 2

I think I found out myself. If I "pretend" to have an english keyboard and just click Ctr-+ (Ctr-"plus symbol") it seems to work. (to the left of "ü").

This is where the ] Symbol is on the English keyboard.

Make me wonder what else is mapped likethis? Anybody an idea?

Disorganize

Doesn't work for me. You're sure you don't have english layout set in your OS? – Spent

This worked for me in Neovim on Windows. But I do remember I tried this some years ago in Linux with regular vim and it didn't work. – Charlyncharm

Windows 10, German Keyboard Layout and NeoVim : Strg and "+" key work. – Disorganize

Answer 3

First off, in this type of Help file, the ^ symbol indicates that you need to hit Ctrl with the key. ^Wc means to hit Ctrl+W, then c after releasing ^W. It looks like you might need to use Ctrl+AltGr+9 to get Ctrl+].

Secondly, Ctrl ("Control") should be equivalent to the Strg ("Steering"?) key on your German keyboard.

(Keyboard equivalents, for your reference. I imagine you can set up Vim to be friendlier to a German keyboard, but that exceeds my knowledge and Google-fu.)

Bookkeeper

Other equivalents: Esc (escape) == ^[, and M-x == "Escape, then x" == "Hold down Meta (usually Alt) and press x". Sometimes "C-x" is written instead of "^X". Though OP didn't ask for them, it still might be useful to know in the future... – Pointenoire

As far as I know "Strg" = "Steuerung" in German (which pretty much translates to "Control" or "Steering") – Metralgia

I wouldn't re-map the controls to be friendlier to the German layout, simply because this would reduce your productivity on everything that's not set up that way. – Metralgia

Although I basically like how this site is put up, these "key" things are just terrible. Make reading the post almost impossible. – Brewery

Answer 4

In Vim you can use strg+click to follow a link as an alternative to ctrl+]. While this is not ideal it at least allows Vim beginners like me to navigate through the manual.

Northwest

doesn't work in a terminal – Shanks