Search a String within a Text Object - Kentaro Kuribayashi's blog

vim-operator-search is a really life-changing Vim plugin for me. It allows you to search a string within a text object, which is useful, for instance, when you want to search a certain string only in a function.

Imagine there is such a code below, which can't be shown in a screen without scrolling, and you want to search $arg to investigate how it is used in the function:

$arg ... // <- not searched

function longLongFunction($arg) {
    $arg ... // <- searched

    // ... snip ...

    $arg ... // <- searched

    // ... snip ...

    $arg ... // <- searched
}

$arg ... // <- not searched

You can search $arg with simple keybind using vim-operator-search and vim-textobj-function with its extension, vim-textobj-function-php.

After installing the plugins described above, add the setting into your .vimrc:

nmap <Space>/ <Plug>(operator-search)if

If your cursor is within the function, you can search $arg by pushing <Space>/. Of course, with another textobj-function plugins such as textobj-function-perl, textobj-function-ruby or others, you can utilise the functionality also in other languages.