I like line numbers because when I'm editing code in a remote meeting, I or someone else can refer to lines by number. The current line is not the only one that matters. I use relative line numbers because I like doing e.g. 9k or whatever. Others on a remote call often refer to other parts of the code with "9 up" or "9 down" (since "9k" and "9j" sound too alike in a noisy call).
It makes it easy to jump to other lines on your screen, e.g. maybe you want to split out half the code from a loop to another function. You can't use di{ to delete everything in the {} because you only want half of it, but if you can see that the loop contents end on line 98 you can go d98G
I gave up absolute line numbers a few years ago in exchange for `:set rnu` and while my navigation capabilities (at least to anywhere I can see) have gotten a lot faster, the ability to `>>` a handful of lines without having to count has felt a ton more productive
Nope. Back in the day that would greatly interfere with copy/paste. One way or another, it's so easy to see what line number you're on and/or jump to a specific line.
If vim doesn't have clipboard support enabled, then this is one way to copy and paste. The vim packages in the Fedora repositories are configured such that vim doesn't have clipboard support, but gvim does.
Not GP, but for me it's simply that I remember it (or rather don't need to, because it's just using general purpose mechanisms that I already remember).
But now you've said it maybe I'll remember if I need it today, and.. well I'll see.