Reverse a word in Vim

Question

How can I reverse a word in Vim? Preferably with a regex or normal-mode commands, but other methods are welcome too:

word => drow

<

Answer 1

I don't have Python supported on my VIM, but it looks like it would be pretty simple to do it with Python. This article seems like a good explanation of how to use Python in VIM and I'm guessing you'd do something like this:

:python 'word'[::-1]

The article indicates that the result will appear in the status bar, which would be non-optimal if you were trying to replace the string in a document, but if you just want to check that your girlfriend is properly reversing strings in her head, this should be fine.

Answer 2

if your version of VIM supports it you can do vw\is or viw\is (put your cursor at the first letter of the word before typing the command)... but I have had a lot of compatibility issues with that. Not sure what has to be compiled in or turned on but this only works sometimes.

EDIT:

\is is:

:<C-U>let old_reg_a=@a<CR>
\ :let old_reg=@"<CR>
\ gv"ay :let @a=substitute(@a, '.\(.*\)\@=', '\=@a[strlen(submatch(1))]', 'g')<CR> 
\ gvc<C-R>a<Esc> :let @a=old_reg_a<CR> 
\ :let @"=old_reg<CR>

Didn't remember where it came from but a google search come this article on vim.wikia.com. Which shows the same thing so I guess that's it.

Answer 3

This Tip might help: http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Reverse_letters

Answer 4

Well you could use python itself to reverse the line through the filter command. Say the text you had written was:

Python

You could reverse it by issuing.

:1 ! python -c "print raw_input()[::-1]"

And your text will be replaced to become:

nohtyP

The "1" in the command tells vi to send line 1 to the python statement which we are executing: "print raw_input()[::-1]". So if you wanted some other line reversed, you would send that line number as argument. The python statement then reverses the line of input.