Question

I want to paste something I have cut from my desktop into a file open in Vi.

But if I paste the tabs embed on top of each other across the page.

I think it is some sort of visual mode change but can’t find the command.

Answer 1

If you’re using plain vi:

You probably have autoindent on. To turn it off while pasting:

<Esc> :set noai  <paste all you want>  <Esc> :set ai 

I have in my .exrc the following shortcuts:

map ^P :set noai^M map ^N :set ai^M 

Note that these have to be the actual control characters – insert them using Ctrl–V Ctrl–P and so on.

If you’re using vim:

Use the paste option. In addition to disabling autoindent it will also set other options such as textwidth and wrapmargin to paste-friendly defaults:

<Esc> :set paste  <paste all you want>  <Esc> :set nopaste 

You can also set a key to toggle the paste mode. My .vimrc has the following line:

set pastetoggle=<C-P> " Ctrl-P toggles paste mode