C70:editor-people (06/15/82)
>From LAWS@SRI-AI Tue Jun 15 02:24:32 1982
A note on the VI use of hjkl for cursor control:
Evidently this got started because ASCII uses control-J for
linefeed. Various software and hardware designers have thus
built their cursor arrows around ^J for downward movement.
(Or possibly ASCII picked it up from a cursor system?) The
VI system uses hjkl for left/down/up/right, but I generally
use the space bar for right motion. I have also seen cursor
arrows in a left/right/up/down or up/down/left/right pattern,
but no linear arrangement can be as satisfactory as a 2-D one.
The best ^J pattern would seem to be hujk for left/up/down/right,
although that does mean moving off the home keys. Even better
is to forget ^J altogether. I once built an 8-direction pad
using the 8 keys around j, but it wasn't very satisfactory.
-- Ken Laws
-------