Answer by lovecraftian for How can I make Vim paste from (and copy to) the system's clipboard?

A quick note for people whose Vim installation does not support the * and + registers. It is not necessary to download a new Vim installation to paste from the clipboard. Here is an alternative method:

1. Install parcellite (a clipboard manager with a low memory footprint);

2. In your .vimrc file, add the following:

   command Clip r !parcellite -c

3. Restart vim.

Now when you type in :Clip as an ex command, the contents of the clipboard will be pasted in at the cursor. You can also map the new command to a function key so as to be able to do this with one keystroke.