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Can Wq In Vim Write Only A Selected Range To The File?

2025-09-07 20:37:38 121

3 Answers

Ian

2025-09-11 11:38:40

I tend to be cautious with destructive edits, so I treat writing ranges like a two-step operation. First, visually select the lines and run :'<,'>w somefile to export them to a separate file. That way I can inspect the result outside Vim before doing anything irreversible. If you do want to overwrite the current file directly, :'<,'>w % will do it, but remember your open buffer won’t automatically reflect that disk change.

An alternative I use when permissions are awkward is :'<,'>w !sudo tee % — it writes the selection back to the same filename with sudo. For totally safe play, write to /tmp or a .bak and then move the file from a shell; it’s a little extra work but saves headaches. Try it on a throwaway file a couple times and you’ll see how the range notation behaves, then pick the workflow that fits your comfort level.

Heidi

2025-09-12 00:32:17

Okay, short practical yes/no first: you can't make the plain :wq magically write only a visual selection and then quit without telling Vim exactly what range to write, but Vim absolutely can write just a selected range to a file — you just use a range with :w (and you can follow it with |q to quit).

If you visual-select some lines (V or v), hit :, and you'll see something like :'<,'> already filled in. From there you can do :'<,'>w /path/to/outfile to write only those lines to that file. If you want to overwrite the current file on disk with just the selection, you can use :'<,'>w % (where % expands to the current filename) — be careful: that will replace the file on disk with only the selected lines and your buffer will still contain the original full text, so it's easy to get into a mismatch. A safer pattern is to write the selection to a temp file first (:'<,'>w /tmp/sel) and then move it into place from the shell, or visually check and then replace.

If permissions are the issue (trying to write to a root-owned path), a neat trick is :'<,'>w !sudo tee % — that sends the selected lines to sudo tee which writes to the file with elevated rights. To write selection and quit in one go, you can chain commands: :'<,'>w /path/to/outfile | q. Bottom line: :wq itself writes the whole buffer, but Vim's :w supports ranges and external commands, so you can definitely write only a selected range — just mind backups and file vs buffer consistency.

Harper

2025-09-12 06:52:38

I like quick, no-nonsense workflows, so here's the practical route I actually use: visually select what you want (V to select whole lines), press :, and you'll get :'<,'> auto-populated. Then do :'<,'>w newfile to dump only that selection into 'newfile'. It’s the cleanest way to extract parts of a buffer without touching the rest.

If your goal is to replace the current file with just that selection, :'<,'>w % will overwrite the file with the selection — but that can be risky because your buffer still holds the original content. I usually avoid that unless I made a backup first (:w filename.bak). For systems where permission blocks writing, :'<,'>w !sudo tee % is a lifesaver; it pipes the selection through sudo and writes it to the current filename. Also, if you want to save the selection and quit right away, append |q, like :'<,'>w selected.txt | q. These little range tricks are super handy once you get comfortable with them.

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