Keyboard-Driven Search and Replace

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Keyboard-driven search and replace are available in the Mini-search sub-menu of the Edit menu. These are normally initiated with the key bindings shown in the menu and can be controlled entirely from the keyboard. All interaction with the mini-search manager occurs in the status area at the bottom of the IDE window.

For keyboard personalities like Emacs and VI/Vim, Wing will emulate the appropriate bindings for that editor.

Forward and Backward display an initially blank search area at the bottom of the IDE window to search in the current source editor, starting from the current position. The search takes place as you type and can be aborted with Esc or Ctrl-G, which restore the original selection and scroll position.

Searching is case-insensitive unless you enter a capital letter as part of your search string.

To move through matches in the editor, press the key binding for the command repeatedly. The search direction can be changed by using the key binding for the other search direction.

When search is first initiated, pressing the key binding a second time enters the most recent search string. When the top or bottom of the file is reached, press the key binding again to cause the search to wrap.

While the mini-search area is visible, Ctrl-W adds the current word in the editor to the search string. Pressing Ctrl-W repeatedly adds subsequent words.

Selection Forward and Selection Backward start mini-search with the current selection in the editor.

Regex Forward and Regex Backward start mini-search using the search string as a regular expression.

Query/Replace and Query/Replace Regex prompt for Search and Replace strings in the status area at the bottom of the IDE window. Tab moves between the fields and Enter starts the search from the current caret position in the editor. For each match, press y to replace or n to move on to the next match without replacing. The interaction can be canceled with Esc or Ctrl-G.

Matching is case insensitive unless a capital letter is entered as part of the search string.

Searching is always forward and stops at the end of the file, without wrapping.

Replace String and Replace Regex work like Query/Replace but immediately replace all matches without prompting.

When a match is visited in the editor, Wing highlights it briefly with a callout, as configured from the Editor > Callouts preferences group.