Standard python interpreter has a vi command mode?

Question

I was working a bit in the python interpreter (python 2.4 on RHEL 5.3), and suddenly found myself in what seems to be a \'vi command mode\'. That is, I can edit previous com

Answer 1

This kind of all depends on a few things.

First of all, the python shell uses readline, and as such, your ~/.inputrc is important here. That's the same with psql the PostgreSQL command-line interpreter and mysql the MySQL shell. All of those can be configured to use vi-style command bindings, with history etc.

<ESC> will put you into vi mode at the python shell once you've got your editing mode set to vi

You may need the following definition in your ~/.inputrc

set editing-mode vi

OSX info

OSX uses libedit which uses ~/.editrc. You can man editrc for more information.

For example, to mimick a popular key combination which searches in your history, you can add the following to your .editrc

bind "^R" em-inc-search-prev

Answer 2

Ctrl-Alt-J switches from Emacs mode to Vi mode in readline programs.

Alternatively add "set editing-mode vi" to your ~/.inputrc

Answer 3

For Mac OS X 10.10.3, python2.7, vi mode can be configured by placing bind -v in ~/.editrc. The last few paragraphs of the man page hint at this.

Answer 4

Use readline.parse_and_bind method. For example, try on python interactive console:

import readline
readline.parse_and_bind("set editing-mode vi")

It seems any command you can set in .inputrc you can set via this method too. I tried it in Python 2.7 and 3.5.1.

See also man readline

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EDIT (Dec 21th, 2019): or maybe, to have a true vim you can manage to patch the python's readline with Athame. I did it with bash and it is very cool.