vi show line numbers in linux

In this post, we will see how to show/hide line number in vi/vim text editor.
Let’s say you are working on any shell script and you are debugging an issue. In this scenario, line number can help you to debug issue better.

Here are the steps to show line numbers in vi/vim text editor.

You will see below screen.

1. Press ESC key.
2. Press : and type "set number"
3. Press enter

Alternatively, you can do follow as well’

1. Press ESC key.
2. Press : and type "set nu"
3. Press enter
   

Here are the steps to hide line numbers in vi/vim text editor.

1. Press ESC key.
2. Press : and type "set nonumber"
3. Press enter
   
   

   
   Alternatively, you can do follow as well’

4. Press ESC key.
5. Press : and type "set nu!"
6. Press enter
   

vi show line numbers by default

If you want to permanently see line number when you start vi/vim editor.
You need to do following.

and append below line.

How to open file at specific line number

Let’s say you are going through big log file and want to open file at specific line number, you can use following command.

If you want to open line at 300 for file applicationLog.log, then you can use following command.

That’s all abut vi show line numbers in linux.