VI Editor : Yank the entire file to clipboard (specific to OS X)

Question

Is there any way to copy all lines from a file to clipboard in VI editor. I have tried *yG, +yG, \"+yG and :%y+ from prev

Answer 1

G just means "go to the end of the file", and you need quotes before * or + to make them effective as clipboard registers. You're looking for something more like gg"*yG which means:

gg - go to the top of the file

"* - use the * register

y - begin yank

G - go to the bottom of the file

or you could use :!cat % | pbcopy which is not unlike the fine solutions romainl provided.