Macros in vim can call themselves; so if you want to make an edit across an entire file, something like: <esc>qqq //clear q macro qq //start recording q

Macros in vim can call themselves; so if you want to make an edit across an entire file, something like: <esc>qqq //clear q macro qq //start recording q macro /foo // search for something 3clbar // do some edit @q // call q macro q //done recording @q //invoke q macro No need to guess how many times to call your macro.