I was taught that one by the brother-in-law. He also tried to teach me 1234l (the letter 'l') to go to the end of a line. I figured out a better way pretty quickly on that one.
I didn't find the magical 'g' until much later, and 1G was already burned into my synapses. I'm trying to change. It's a little awkward :)
That's actually kind of an interesting idea. $ for end-of-line always bugs me; for something so common I don't think it should require a chord. '999l' is pretty easy to tap out.
On the other hand, it would probably be easier to rebind something like '-' as end-of-line. I'd do backspace, but I've already changed that to PageUp (backspace/space work great as PageUp/PageDown)
Is it common? It's really rare that I need to go to the end of the line and not switch to insert mode. If I do want to go to the end of the line and switch to insert mode, then what I want is A not $. Of course, there's a chord either way, but I'm surprised if you're finding it easier to type 999l than A.
Oh, no - I use A all the time. My use case is generally more v$ followed by some other movement backwards then c,d or y, or Ctrl-V $ and move upwards/downwards.
I didn't find the magical 'g' until much later, and 1G was already burned into my synapses. I'm trying to change. It's a little awkward :)