Sublime Text 3 Cheatsheet: Boost Your Coding Productivity

This cheatsheet provides essential shortcuts and tips for Sublime Text 3, a powerful and popular code editor. Mastering these commands can significantly enhance your development workflow and efficiency.

Access Every Command with the Command Palette

• Shift + Cmd + P: Open the Command Palette for quick access to all commands.

Navigate Swiftly with Goto Anything

• Cmd + P: Quickly open files by name.
• Ctrl + G: Jump to a specific line number.
• Cmd + P: Utilize fuzzy search for files and commands.
• Cmd + R: Navigate to symbols (functions, classes, etc.) within the current file.

Efficient Selections and Multi-Cursor Editing

• Cmd + D: Select the next occurrence of the current word.
• Cmd + K, Cmd + D: Skip the current selection and add the next occurrence.
• Cmd + U: Undo the last quick selection.
• Cmd + L: Select the entire current line.
• Ctrl + Cmd + G: Select all occurrences of the current selection in the file.
• Shift + Cmd + Space: Expand selection to the current scope (e.g., inside parentheses, quotes).
• Shift + Cmd + L: Split the current selection into multiple lines, one for each line selected.

Streamline Code Editing

• Cmd + J: Join the current line with the next line.
• Cmd + Shift + D: Duplicate the current line or selection.
• Cmd + Shift + R: Re-indent the current selection or file according to syntax rules.
• Cmd + Shift + K: Delete the current line.
• Ctrl + Cmd + Up/Down Arrow: Move the current line or selection up or down.
• Alt + Cmd + V: Paste from the clipboard history.
• Shift + Cmd + /: Comment or uncomment the current line or selection.
• Alt + Backspace: Delete the word to the left of the cursor.
• Alt + Fn + Backspace: Delete the word to the right of the cursor (forward delete word).
• Cmd + Shift + Enter: Insert a new line above the current line.
• Cmd + Enter: Insert a new line below the current line.
• Ctrl + K, Ctrl + L: Convert the selection to lowercase.
• Ctrl + K, Ctrl + U: Convert the selection to uppercase.

Powerful Searching Capabilities

• Cmd + F: Search for text within the current file.
• Shift + Cmd + F: Search for text across all open files and folders.
• <open files>: Use this as a filter in the search panel to limit searches to specific open files.

Miscellaneous Useful Commands

• Alt + Cmd + Right/Left Arrow: Switch between open tabs.
• Ctrl + ]: Indent the current selection.
• Ctrl + [: Unindent the current selection.
• Alt + -: Go back to the previous cursor position.
• Alt + Shift + -: Go forward to the next previous cursor position.
• Ctrl + B: Build and execute the current file (if configured for the language).

Must-Have Sublime Text Packages for Developers

Enhance your Sublime Text experience with these essential packages. Install them via Package Control:

• A File Icon: Adds file-specific icons to the sidebar.
• BracketHighlighter: Highlights matching brackets and tags.
• Color Highlighter: Displays colors inline for CSS/Sass/LESS.
• Comment-Snippets: Provides snippets for common comment formats.
• DevDocs: Integrates DevDocs.io for quick API documentation lookup.
• EditorConfig: Supports EditorConfig files for consistent coding styles.
• Emmet: A toolkit for high-speed HTML, CSS, and XML writing.
• File Rename: Provides a more robust file renaming experience.
• Git: Integrates Git version control features.
• Git blame: Shows Git blame annotations.
• GitGutter: Shows Git diff markers in the gutter.
• HTML-CSS-JS Prettify: Formats HTML, CSS, and JavaScript code.
• JavaScript Completions: Enhanced JavaScript autocompletion.
• JavaScript Patterns: Provides JavaScript code snippets.
• JavaScript Snippets: More JavaScript code snippets.
• LESS: Syntax highlighting and support for LESS.
• Nodejs: Node.js build system and autocompletion.
• Package Control: The essential package manager for Sublime Text.
• Pretty JSON: Formats and validates JSON data.
• SideBarEnhancements: Adds many new features to the sidebar.
• SublimeLinter: A framework for linting code.
• SublimeLinter-contrib-eslint: ESLint integration for SublimeLinter.
• Terminal: Opens an integrated terminal.
• Termius: SSH client and terminal emulator.
• Auto Save: Automatically saves files.

Customizing Your Sublime Text Preferences

Here's an example of a Preferences.sublime-settings file to customize your editor:

{
    "color_scheme": "Packages/User/Color Highlighter/themes/Boxy Ocean.tmTheme",
    "detect_indentation": false,
    "folder_exclude_patterns":
    [
        "node_modules",
        ".svn",
        ".git",
        ".meteor/local"
    ],
    "ignored_packages":
    [
        "Vintage"
    ],
    "show_definitions": true,
    "theme": "Adaptive.sublime-theme"
}

Custom Keybindings for Enhanced Workflow

Modify your keybindings to suit your preferences. Here's an example Default (OSX).sublime-keymap file:

[
    { "keys": ["super+v"], "command": "paste_and_indent" },
    { "keys": ["super+shift+v"], "command": "paste" },
    { "keys": ["super+shift+r"], "command": "reindent" },
    { "keys": ["super+h"], "command": "dev_docs_search_selection" }
]

Syncing Sublime Text Settings with iCloud

Keep your Sublime Text settings and packages synchronized across multiple Macs using iCloud.

Syncing Settings to iCloud:

1. Navigate to the Sublime Text packages directory: cd ~/Library/Application\ Support/Sublime\ Text\ 3/Packages
2. Create a directory for your Sublime Text settings in iCloud Drive: mkdir -p ~/Library/Mobile\ Documents/com\~apple\~CloudDocs/WebDev/ST3/Plugins
3. Move your existing User package (containing settings and keybindings) to the iCloud directory: mv User ~/Library/Mobile\ Documents/com\~apple\~CloudDocs/WebDev/ST3/Plugins
4. Create a symbolic link from the original location to the new iCloud location: ln -s ~/Library/Mobile\ Documents/com\~apple\~CloudDocs/WebDev/ST3/Plugins/User

Restoring Settings from iCloud:

1. Navigate to the Sublime Text packages directory: cd ~/Library/Application\ Support/Sublime\ Text\ 3/Packages
2. Remove the existing User directory: rm -rf User
3. Create a new symbolic link pointing to your User directory in iCloud: ln -s ~/Library/Mobile\ Documents/com\~apple\~CloudDocs/WebDev/ST3/Plugins/User

By following these steps, you can ensure your Sublime Text configuration is always up-to-date and accessible from any of your Macs.