I’m a new SublimeText 2 user (Windows), and I’m having trouble using macros. I’m not sure whether they are broken, or whether they simply are very different from Vim or Emacs macros. When I record a simple macro it works OK, but anything complicated goes haywire: it does what I want when I record it the first time, but not on subsequent calls. I’ve noticed additional problems:

1. If I save the macro to disk, it sometimes seems to have more key strokes in it than it ought to. I recorded a macro where I began by jumping forward a couple of words (Control-Right) and then back a word (Control-Left); the macro on disk began with what seemed like a very long string of word movements.

2. If I save the macro to disk in my User package, it appears on the Tools/Macros submenu…but selecting it from that submenu doesn’t appear to do anything.

3. Any macro that includes searching (i.e., the “f” command in Vintage mode) appears to do the wrong thing when played back.

Is it broken? Am I missing something?

Here’s a painfully detailed example of what I’m trying to do. I’ve got a code file with a lot of entries that look like this:

    typemethod SOMENAME {fdict} {
        ...
    }

The macro is supposed to change one of the above to something more or less like this:

    define SOMENAME {
        typemethod ruleset {fdict} {
            ...
        }
    }

So I start at the beginning of the first line, select the name, e.g., “SOMENAME”, cut it, replace it with rule set, move to the line above, type in "define " and paste the name, and then use Control-M to jump to the bottom and add the closing “}”.

I’ve tried this using Vintage commands. I’ve tried in INSERT mode using normal ST movement and selection commands (e.g., Control-D Control-X to cut the name instead of Vi’s “cw”). It works when when I record it, but when I replay it on the next instance, the “define SOMENAME” ends up a couple of lines below the “typemethod” line, instead of right above it.

Note: I’ve also tried it using multiple selections; that worked great until it came time to paste the name into its new spot. All of the names I’d cut all went into the first selection.