@GregoryNisbet Hello

Hi.

So, <C-v>I will put the text not at the beginning of the line, but right before the first column of the selection. I thought that you had a number and a letter on each line, and that you wanted to put the pound sign before the letter but after the number

Which I guess wouldn't be impossible, but would be kinda hard

Ah, that example was supposed to illustrate how using I/A in visual line mode doesn't allow you to put text at the beginning/end of a range of lines

what I want to be able to do is select a region with visual line mode, but have it act like a visual block starting at column zero and extending to the end of the widest line when using I and A

Yeah, that makes sense now

@DJMcMayhem I think one of your earlier comments was right though. <c-v>A from visual line mode places you right after the first column. It's probably nontrivial to determine the length of the widest line in a range.

Hmm? I didn't say anything about <C-v>A in my comment

oh I thought you said that visual line mode has no concept of which columns are currently being selected

Oh. Yeah, that's true. But that's because I thought you wanted the pound sign in the middle of the line.

I just posted an answer. Let me know how that works for you

but it does have another effect. namely that selecting a range of lines in visual line mode, switching to visual block mode, Appending some text and then hitting <esc> inserts text after the first column in the line. Switching from visual line mode to visual block mode doesn't extend the block rightward in a useful fashion.

thanks.

Glad I could help :)

Personally, I'd find it more useful if it did just extend the right edge of the block to the end of the current line, but oh well

Is there a way to do that? seems like a "jaggedness toggle" would do the trick.

A visual block with $ as a boundary seems like a magical kind of block.