Buffers & Attachment

Buffers (practical)

A buffer is Vim's in-memory version of your text.

The file on disk is the "official record." The buffer is what you currently see on screen.

Buffers

The classic problem is thinking you're doing "a tiny edit":

• one quick fix
• one small rename
• one harmless search-and-replace

Then Vim asks if you want to save, and you're negotiating with your past and future self.

Two exits

:wq — keep the changes

:q! — throw the changes away