how to do a vim search inverse search for all lines with out text
:g/pattern/
matches all the lines were pattern is found.
:v/pattern/
does the opposite. See :h global
for more details.
You can use it like this:
:v/pattern/norm Ipattern not found - <CR>
to prepend "pattern not found - " to every line that doesn't have "pattern" or
:v/pattern/s/nrettap/pattern
to replace "nrettap" with "pattern" on every line that doesn't have "pattern".
Contrived examples, yes.
To search for the lines not containing foo, for example, do:
/^\(\(.*foo.*\)\@!.\)*$
Source: http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Search_for_lines_not_containing_pattern_and_other_helpful_searches