Transform sequence of lines into python list, using Vim?

Question

Using Vim, in a file containing strings on successive lines:

bear
fox
jackie chan

What's a good, repeatable way to make a python list of strings:

['bear', 'fox', 'jackie chan']

Tried a kludgy sequence of regexs over the range (such as :1,3s/^/'/, :1,3s/$\n/', /, followed by pesky hand edits.

Answer 1

ggcG                           change the whole buffer

<C-r>=string(split(@"))<CR>    insert a string representation of
                               the content of the unnamed register

<Esc>                          leave insert mode

Answer 2

You can use multiple substitutions and :join to accomplish this:

:%s/^\s*\zs.*/'&',/|'[,']j|s//[&]/

This will yield:

['bear', 'fox', 'jackie chan',]

Personally I like the trailing comma, but you can remove it with another substitution or :normal command:

%s/^\s*\zs.*/'&',/|'[,']j|s//[&]/|s/,]$/]
%s/^\s*\zs.*/'&',/|'[,']j|exe "norm! $x"|s//[&]/

For more help see:

:h :s
:h \zs
:h :j
:h :norm
:h :exe
:h :bar
:h :range
:h '[

Answer 3

I'd go with a macro:

qq0i'^[$a',^[

This wrap the line into a '...',

You can select all your lines and apply the macro with:

:normal! @q

Then you can add a [ before the first line, a ] after the last one and

vipJ

Answer 4

Solution

:s/\(.*\)\n\(.*\)\n\(.*\)/['\1', '\2', '\3']/

Answer 5

With my Join plugin (https://github.com/sk1418/Join), you can join lines with separator. For the given example, you can do:

:%s/^\|$/'/g|%J ','

then manually add the [' and '] to BOL and EOL

or just

:%J "','"

then manually add [' and '] to BOL and EOL