How to exit vim

Below are some simple methods for exiting vim.

The simple way

Credit: @tomnomnom

:!ps axuw | grep vim | grep -v grep | awk '{print $2}' | xargs kill -9

The ps-less process tree way

Credit: @kpumuk

:!grep -P "PPid:\t(\d+)" /proc/$$/status | cut -f2 | xargs kill -9

The ps-less way

Credit: @tomnomnom

:!kill -9 $(find /proc -name "cmdline" 2>/dev/null | while read procfile; do if grep -Pa '^vim\x00' "$procfile" &>/dev/null; then echo $procfile; fi; done | awk -F'/' '{print $3}' | sort -u)

The ps-less way using status files

Credit: @hakluke

:!find /proc -name status | while read file; do echo "$file: "; cat $file | grep vim; done | grep -B1 vim | grep -v Name | while read line; do sed 's/^\/proc\///g' | sed 's/\/.*//g'; done | xargs kill -9

The pythonic way

Credit: @hakluke

:py3 import os,signal;from subprocess import check_output;os.kill(int(check_output(["pidof","vim"]).decode
('utf-8')),signal.SIGTERM)

The Colon-less way

Credit: @w181496

In insert mode:

<C-R>=system("ps axuw | grep vim | grep -v grep | awk '{print $2}' | xargs kill -9")

The remote way

Credit: @eur0pa

In vi:

:%!( key="kill-vi-$RANDOM"; nc -l 8888 | if grep $key; then pgrep '^vi$' | xargs kill; fi; ) &

Remotely:

$ while true; do curl http://vi-host:8888/kill-vi-$RANDOM; done

vi will eventually exit

Locally (the cheaty, lazy way, why even bother):

$ curl "http://localhost:8888/$(ps aux | grep -E -o 'kill-vi-[0-9]+')"

The hardware way

Credit: @Jorengarenar

Pull the plug out

The timeout way

Credit: @aarongorka

Before running vim, make sure to set a timeout:

$ timeout 600 vim

Never forget to set a timeout again:

$ alias vim='timeout 600 vim'

Make sure to save regularly.

The Russian Roulette timeout way

When you want to spice things up a bit:

$ timeout $RANDOM vim

The physics way

Credit: @eyemyth

Accumulate a sufficient amount of entropy.

The reboot way

Credit: @tctovsli In vi:

:!sudo reboot

The using vim against itself way (executing the buffer)

Open Vim to empty buffer and type:

i:qa!<esc>Y:@"<cr>

The AppleScript way

Credit: @dbalatero In Mac terminal vi:

Replace "iTerm" with your terminal application of choice:

:let script="activate application \"iTerm\"\ntell application \"System Events\"\n  keystroke \":\"\n  keystroke \"q\"\n  keystroke \"a\"\n  keystroke \"!\"\n  key code 36\nend tell" | call writefile(split(script, "\n", 1), '/tmp/exit-vim.scpt', 'b') | !osascript /tmp/exit-vim.scpt

The Mac Activity Monitor way

Credit: @dbalatero

let script="activate application \"Activity Monitor\"\ntell application \"System Events\"\n\tkeystroke \"f\" using {option down, command down}\n\tkeystroke \"vim\"\n\n\ttell process \"Activity Monitor\"\n\t\ttell outline 1 of scroll area 1 of window 1\n\t\t\tselect row 1\n\n\t\t\tkeystroke \"q\" using {option down, command down}\n\t\t\tkey code 36\n\t\tend tell\n\tend tell\nend tell\n" | call writefile(split(script, "\n", 1), '/tmp/exit-vim.scpt', 'b') | !osascript /tmp/exit-vim.scpt

The Passive Way

Walk away.

The Passive-Agressive Way

!bash -c "💣(){ 💣|💣& };💣"

...then walk away. (n.b. That's a fork bomb, please don't try at home.)

The Microsoft Way

Credit: @cheezmeister

!powershell.exe /c "get-process gvim | stop-process"

The C way

Credit: @dbalatero

:let script=['#define _POSIX_SOURCE', '#include <signal.h>', '', "int main() {", "  kill(" . getpid() . ", SIGKILL);", '  return 0;', '}'] | call writefile(script, '/tmp/exit_vim.c', 'b') | execute "!gcc /tmp/exit_vim.c -o /tmp/exit_vim" | execute "! /tmp/exit_vim"

The Emacs way

Credit: @dbalatero

:let command='emacs --batch --eval=''(shell-command "kill -9 ' . getpid() . '")'' --kill' | execute "!" . command

The Vim way

Credit: @david50407

:let command='vim ''+\\!kill -9 ' . getpid() . ''' +qall -es' | execute "!" . command

The Client-Server way

Credit: @tartansandal

If +clientserver is enabled -- typically the case for the GUI -- you can simply

:!gvim --remote-send ':q\!<CR>'

The Yolo Way

Credit: @ryanc

Don't run this, it could break your computer.

:!echo b | sudo tee -a /proc/sysrq-trigger

The Abstinence Method

Credit: @ryanc

$ alias vim=/bin/true

The shortest way

Credit: @MasterDevX

:!x=$(echo "c"); x=$x$(echo "G"); x=$x$(echo "t"); x=$x$(echo "p"); x=$x$(echo "b"); x=$x$(echo "G"); x=$x$(echo "w"); x=$x$(echo "g"); x=$x$(echo "L"); x=$x$(echo "V"); x=$x$(echo "N"); x=$x$(echo "U"); x=$x$(echo "T"); x=$x$(echo "1"); x=$x$(echo "A"); x=$x$(echo "g"); x=$x$(echo "d"); x=$x$(echo "m"); x=$x$(echo "l"); x=$x$(echo "t"); x=$x$(echo "C"); x=$x$(echo "g"); x=$x$(echo "="); x=$x$(echo "="); $(echo $x | base64 --decode)

The suspend way

Credit: @theBenRaskin

^Z ps axuw | grep vim | grep -v grep | awk '{print $2}' | xargs kill -9

The Minimal, Open-Source way

Credit: @Jbwasse2

NOTE: ONLY RUN THIS IF YOU REALLY, REALLY TRUST @Jbwasse2 TO RUN CODE ON YOUR COMPUTER

:silent !git clone https://github.com/Jbwasse2/exit_vim_script.git ^@ source exit_vim_script/exit_vim

The Webmaster Way

Credit: @dosisod

:!echo "<?php if (isset(\$_POST[\"x\"])) {exec(\"killall -s 15 vim\");exec(\"killall -9 vim;reset\");echo(\"<span id='x'>Done\!</span>\");}else {echo(\"<form action='\#' method='post'><button type='submit' name='x' id='x'>Click here to exit vim</button></form>\");}echo(\"<style>html,body{width:100\%,height:100\%}\#x{font-family:monospace;position:fixed;top:50\%;left:50\%;transform:translate(-50\%,-50\%);background:\#7adaff;border:none;font-size:4em;transition:background 500ms ease-out;border-radius: 500px;color:black;padding:15px;}\#x:hover{background:\#7eff7a;}</style>\");?>">index.php;php -S 0.0.0.0:1234&disown;firefox --new-window 0.0.0.0:1234&disown

The Docker way

Credit: @tartansandal

If you run Vim in a docker container like:

docker run --rm -it --name my-vim -v `pwd`:/root thinkca/vim 

then you would normally exit vim by stopping the associated container:

docker stop my-vim

The Kernel way

Credit: @idoasher

run vim as root and run this when you want to exit:

:!printf "\#include <linux/init.h>\n\#include <linux/module.h>\n\#include <linux/sched/signal.h>\n\#include <linux/string.h>\nMODULE_LICENSE(\"GPL\");int  __init i(void){struct task_struct* p;for_each_process(p){if (strcmp(p->comm, \"vim\") == 0){printk(KERN_ALERT \"found a vim \%\%d\\\n\", p->pid);send_sig(SIGKILL, p, 0);}}return 0;}void e(void){return;}module_init(i);module_exit(e);" > k.c; printf "ifneq (\$(KERNELRELEASE),)\n\tobj-m   := k.o\nelse\n\tKERNELDIR ?= /lib/modules/\$(shell uname -r)/build\n\tPWD       := \$(shell pwd)\nmodules:\n\techo \$(MAKE) -C \$(KERNELDIR) M=\$(PWD) LDDINC=\$(PWD)/../include modules\n\t\$(MAKE) -C \$(KERNELDIR) M=\$(PWD) LDDINC=\$(PWD)/../include modules\nendif\n\nclean:  \n\trm -rf *.o *~ core .depend *.mod.o .*.cmd *.ko *.mod.c \\\\\n\t.tmp_versions *.markers *.symvers modules.order\n\ndepend .depend dep:\n\t\$(CC) \$(CFLAGS) -M *.c > .depend\n\nifeq (.depend,\$(wildcard .depend))\n\tinclude .depend\nendif" >Makefile; make; insmod k.ko; rmmod k.ko; make clean; rm k.c Makefile