How to write buffer content to stdout?

Question

Is there any chance to write the content of the current vim buffer to stdout?

I\'d like to use vim to edit content that was passed via stdin - without the need of a

Answer 1

Try something like:

{ FROMCMD | vim - 8>&1 >&9 | tac | tac | TOCMD; } 9>&1

and use ':w !cat >&8' when you are finished editing

'tac | tac' ensures that TOCMD doesn't receive any data until you quite vim, this is only useful if TOCMD writes to the terminal so that it doesn't make a mess while vim is still running.

Notice that running 'less' as your TOCMD (or any other program that do some terminal manipulation) is not going to work as expected because even if you delay the data, the processes still start "at the same time" and may access the terminal at the same time.