Pipe Vim buffer to stdout

Question

I\'d like to use Vim in the middle of a pipe. This existing post looks like what I\'d like to do, except I was hoping to do it without Python\'s help -- only with bash. [It it

Answer 1

Take a look at vipe which is part of moreutils. It allows you to use any editor as part of a pipe.

 ls -al | vipe | less

To use it with vim just make sure to set it as your default editor in your bashrc or cshrc or whatever shell you use.

 EDITOR=vim

UPDATE: If you want a bash only solution you could use a script like this

 #!/bin/bash
 # create temporary file
 TMPFILE=`mktemp /tmp/vipe.bashXXXXXXXX`
 cat > ${TMPFILE}
 vim ${TMPFILE} < /dev/tty > /dev/tty
 cat ${TMPFILE}
 rm ${TMPFILE}

For a more portable version please replace

 vim ${TMPFILE}

with

 ${EDITOR} ${TMPFILE}