Navigating to next hunk in a patch file using VIM

Question

Some of us are familiar with patch failures like "Hunk #11 FAILED at 958." -- is there a command in VIM that allows me to go to, say, 11th hunk ... without having to manually count it? Even a shortcut to go to the next patch would useful.

Is there any?

Answer 1

A simple method to move between patch hunks is first to search for the beginning of the patch marker

• in a unified diff

  /^@@Enter

• in a context diff

  /^\*\{15}Enter

and then to move to the next hunk by repeating the search with

n (or multiple hunks at a time, e.g. 3n)

To move backwards by hunks use

N (or e.g. 4N)

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If you know all the hunk numbers you need to see, e.g. the 11^th and 24^th hunk, you can first use the amount prefix search Hugh suggested: 11/^@@Enter and after that move to 24^th hunk either by calculating always from the top: gg24n or by direct forward advance: 13n (hunk #24 is 13 hunks ahead from the 11^th).

Answer 2

Starting from the first line of a patch file in command mode*, you can go to the 11th hunk:-

• in a context diff:

  11/^\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*Enter

• in a unified diff:

  11/^@@Enter

* and by command mode, I mean what the help calls normal mode - that is, not insert mode, and not command-line mode (:)