Buffer management

Buffers manage the display of files and other information, e.g. REPL, terminal, etc.

Opening a file replaces the content in the current buffer.

Listing open buffers

Space b b to select a buffer from a list of buffers

A helm pop-up window appears at the bottom listing all open buffers. The helm popup window also shows recently opened buffers.

Enter to open the highlighted buffer.

Alt+D closes the currently selected buffer and remains in the buffer list.

Buffer Transient State

Space b . launches buffer transient state to manage buffers using single character keybindings.

n and N to cycyle forward and backward through open buffers.

d to close the current buffer.

Close buffers using buffer menu

Use helm-mini menu when you have a large number of buffers to delete.

Space b b to open the buffer helm-mini menu

Ctrl j and Ctrl k to navigate buffer names in the list of open buffers

Ctrl Space to mark a buffer for deletion

Meta D deletes all marked buffers

Commonly used keybindings

Vim Normal	Description
Space b .	Enter buffer transient state
b	list open buffers
h	switch to home buffer
m	switch to home message
n	Show next buffer
N or p	Show previous buffer
q	Quit the buffer transient state