Shell Programming and Scripting

How can using Vim, replace one character with another repeating it 10 times?
Ex.:
Transforming this: 125A986
That: 125##########986

Deleted, did not read correctly the subject :X

Couple ways I can think of doing something like this. Search/replace all instances of 'A' with 'XXXXXXXXXX':

Code:

:%s/A/XXXXXXXXXX/g

or.. search for the character you want with '/A'. Once found (or before) map a key to perform the switch on the next character in your search:

Code:

:map v nxiXXXXXXXXXX^V[ESC]

I tend to use 'v' as my mapped key since it isn't used for anything else.

Peterro, I really use the command:%s/A/XXXXXXXXXX/g", however, I need a command that can be used in situations that have to repeat the character 10, 100, 1000, 10000 times. Understand?

Well, the best I've come up with is to:

Code:

:map v iX^[

where X is the character you want as the replacement. Now search for the character you want to replace and when you find it, press 'x' to remove that character and then type:

Code:

100v

This will insert 100 of the replacement characters. Hit 'n' to go to the next character to be replaced.

It's not really an ideal solution but it sort of gives you what you're looking for. I was unable to get a search '/' or character replacement 's' to work as a map to be performed multiple times. Maybe someone else has a better solution.

Thanks Peterro, solved my problem. I will continue looking for a script that solves this problem more generic.

Glad it worked, are you really looking for a script solution or one that is in vi/vim like your original post suggested?