Re: Dificulties to launch KDE

From: Andrew Reilly (andrew-newspost_at_areilly.bpc-users.org)
Date: 10/21/05 

Date: Fri, 21 Oct 2005 09:52:24 +1000

On Thu, 20 Oct 2005 14:05:00 +0000, Bill Vermillion wrote:
> When I get a call to work on some one else's system and find only
> vim there [typical Linux boxen] I get frustrated as it's not
> just like vi. I may be an 'old fart' in that respect but I've used
> a real 'vi' since 1983 and so many clones/workalikes aren't cloned
> closely enought or don't work just like the original.

Well, it wouldn't be "improved" if it was the same :-)

I can't say that I've tried it, but does vim's "compatability mode" get
close enough?

I thought that they'd (Bram et al) done a pretty good job of
compatability: for the most part the extensions are in areas where
original vi didn't do anything (or anything useful) anyway. Like being
able to move the insertion point while in insert mode. I haven't been
using vi for quite as long as you, only since '86 or so, and I find vim
fits me quite handily.

Really, the not-editing-in-place thing is the only bit that bugs me, and
that's only because it's incompatible with things like vipw and crontab
-e, both of which could plausibly be changed to re-open the file rather
than hanging onto a link.

No, I don't want vim in the base system. It's perfectly happy in ports,
and it gets modified/updated/tweaked/patched far too often to be
maintained in base. Nvi is great for the base-system vi.

Cheers, 

-- 
Andrew