chris@umcp-cs.UUCP (Chris Torek) (12/08/84)
It may either be considered a bug or a feature that running ``vi''
in your home directory causes it to read your .exrc twice.
--
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In-Real-Life: Chris Torek, Univ of MD Comp Sci Dept (301) 454-7690
UUCP: {seismo,allegra,brl-bmd}!umcp-cs!chris
CSNet: chris@umcp-cs ARPA: chris@marylandmark@cbosgd.UUCP (Mark Horton) (12/09/84)
In article <1705@umcp-cs.UUCP> chris@umcp-cs.UUCP (Chris Torek) writes: >It may either be considered a bug or a feature that running ``vi'' >in your home directory causes it to read your .exrc twice. This is true. What really happens is that if you don't have an EXINIT in your environment, vi sources ~/.exrc and also ./.exrc, in case you have local options for the current directory. If you're in your home directory, it will source the same file twice. If you have an EXINIT in your environment instead of a ~/.exrc file, you won't have this problem. Since .exrc files have other problems (speed and funny characters like ^D stripped) it is strongly recommended that you use EXINIT instead of ~/.exrc. Since .exrc and EXINIT normally contain set and map and abbr commands, it's usually harmless for the .exrc file to be sourced twice.
martillo@mit-athena.ARPA (Joaquim Martillo) (12/09/84)
Why is the net so cluttered with discussions of vi? Vi is an archaic editor which ATT in their infinite stupidity decided to make the official unix editor. I have a workstation (Blit-like but better). I can do block modes of text from one window to another. Think what would happen if I tried to do a block mode of text to a window where vi was being run in command mode. Disaster strikes! Emacs is primitive compared to my terminal. I should be able to press a key and then italic bit-maps should be put in my file as the italics appear on my screen. Likewise for other fonts or foreign character sets. To tell the truth in five-years ascii oriented editors will be a bad memory. Black holes are outta sight!
mark@elsie.UUCP (Mark J. Miller) (12/11/84)
> Why is the net so cluttered with discussions of vi? > > Vi is an archaic editor which ATT in their infinite stupidity decided > to make the official unix editor. > > I have a workstation (Blit-like but better). I can do block modes of > text from one window to another. ... Yes, but how many different terminals will your editor run on? -- Mark J. Miller NIH/NCI/DCE/LEC UUCP: decvax!harpo!seismo!elsie!mark Phone: (301) 496-5688
lmc@denelcor.UUCP (Lyle McElhaney) (12/11/84)
> Vi is an archaic editor which ATT in their infinite stupidity decided > to make the official unix editor. Oh, boy, here comes that rich kid again. > > I have a workstation (Blit-like but better). I can do block modes of > text from one window to another. Think what would happen if I tried to > do a block mode of text to a window where vi was being run in command > mode. Disaster strikes! Emacs is primitive compared to my terminal. I > should be able to press a key and then italic bit-maps should be put in > my file as the italics appear on my screen. Likewise for other fonts or > foreign character sets. To tell the truth in five-years ascii oriented > editors will be a bad memory. No doubt for some they will. Right now I'd kill for a Wyse50... > > Black holes are outta sight! Nothing further to add. He's said it all. Now, for the rest of us, about vi.... -- Lyle McElhaney {hao, stcvax, brl-bmd, nbires, csu-cs} !denelcor!lmc
dmmartindale@watcgl.UUCP (Dave Martindale) (12/11/84)
In article <64@mit-athena.ARPA> martillo@mit-athena.ARPA (Joaquim Martillo) writes: >Why is the net so cluttered with discussions of vi? > >Vi is an archaic editor which ATT in their infinite stupidity decided >to make the official unix editor. > >I have a workstation (Blit-like but better). I can do block modes of >text from one window to another. Think what would happen if I tried to >do a block mode of text to a window where vi was being run in command >mode. Disaster strikes! Emacs is primitive compared to my terminal. I >should be able to press a key and then italic bit-maps should be put in >my file as the italics appear on my screen. Likewise for other fonts or >foreign character sets. To tell the truth in five-years ascii oriented >editors will be a bad memory. Why is the net so cluttered with bragging? Dave Martindale
henry@utzoo.UUCP (Henry Spencer) (12/11/84)
> ... I > should be able to press a key and then italic bit-maps should be put in > my file as the italics appear on my screen. Likewise for other fonts or > foreign character sets. To tell the truth in five-years ascii oriented > editors will be a bad memory. By all means let us know when you write a C compiler that accepts bitmaps on its input. Likewise when you have rewritten all the rest of Unix to accept your wondrous new input format. I agree that something along these lines may well have to be done someday... but until then, we've got a *very* large investment in ASCII-based tools. And it's not easy to define a really general-purpose replacement for ASCII, either. -- Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology {allegra,ihnp4,linus,decvax}!utzoo!henry
robert@gitpyr.UUCP (Robert Viduya) (12/12/84)
>< > Why is the net so cluttered with discussions of vi? > > Vi is an archaic editor which ATT in their infinite stupidity decided > to make the official unix editor. > Sure, vi may not have all the features necessary for doing neat things like bit-mapped fonts and what not, but as a programmer's editor, it's simplicity is a boon. I can code a lot faster using an editor like vi because it doesn't get in my way. I don't have to remember what ump- teen million keys on my terminal do because vi doesn't have that many key functions. What key functions it does have are more applicable towards a programming environment rather than a text processing. Who needs to worry about whether they should put keywords in italic and identifiers in boldface when they've got a deadline facing them on a 5000+ line program? As a text processing editor, vi isn't too hot. That much I'll grant you. But for programming, it's pretty hard to beat. There's only one type of editor I know of that can outclass vi in program editing and those are the CPU-crunching, language-sensitive context-editor. I would like to see multi-window/multi-file capabilities added to vi, however. robert -- Robert Viduya Office of Computing Services Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta GA 30332 Phone: (404) 894-4669 ...!{akgua,allegra,amd,hplabs,ihnp4,masscomp,ut-ngp}!gatech!gitpyr!robert ...!{rlgvax,sb1,uf-cgrl,unmvax,ut-sally}!gatech!gitpyr!robert I fly with vi.
garys@bunker.UUCP (Gary M. Samuelson) (12/12/84)
> Why is the net so cluttered with discussions of vi? > > Vi is an archaic editor which ATT in their infinite stupidity decided > to make the official unix editor. I love it when people answer their own questions. To paraphrase, leaving out the derogatory terms, there are a lot of articles discussing vi because there are a lot of people using vi. Simple, no? > I have a workstation (Blit-like but better). I can do block modes of > text from one window to another. I'm proud of you. I have a Fortune 32:16, which has 25 lines by 80 columns of ASCII characters. How does your wonderful workstation help me? > Think what would happen if I tried to > do a block mode of text to a window where vi was being run in command > mode. Disaster strikes! Emacs is primitive compared to my terminal. I > should be able to press a key and then italic bit-maps should be put in > my file as the italics appear on my screen. Likewise for other fonts or > foreign character sets. Think what would happen if I tried to run your bit-mapped application on my ASCII CRT. Talk about disaster. Oh, your article seems to be in ASCII as well. Hmmm... > To tell the truth in five-years ascii oriented > editors will be a bad memory. If it is true that in five years ascii oriented editors will no longer be in widespread use, then I'm sure that the discussions of vi will subside. In the meantime, the fact that we discuss the tools we have rather than the tools we don't have ought not to bother you. > Black holes are outta sight! Snobbery is out of place. Further comments on this topic to net.flame (better yet, /dev/null). *** REPLACE THIS MESS WITH YOUR LINEAGE ***
martillo@mit-athena.ARPA (Joaquim Martillo) (12/13/84)
Maybe I said it wrong (I was tired). Emacs and emacs like editors are upwardly compatible with the type of terminal everyone will have in 5-8 years. Vi is not. ATT knew this (I know because I was there when the decision was made) when they decided to support this editor. Vi is just impossible with the next generation of intelligent terminal.
kay@flame.UUCP (Kay Dekker) (12/15/84)
[my, that was a yummy bug-fix!] Joaquim Martillo says in <64@mit-athena.ARPA> >Why is the net so cluttered with discussions of vi? >... >Emacs is primitive compared to my terminal. >... The net is cluttered with articles on archaic (sic) editors like emacs and vi because, at least here at Warwick, we are cluttered with archaic terminals like the adm3a. I even had to munge emacs to cope with ones that can't do clear to end of line ... Still, I look forward to being able to edit black-letter Gothic files in rotating hexagonal windows :-) Kay. -- "But what we need to know is, do people want nasally-insertable computers?" ... mcvax!ukc!flame!kay
derek@uwvax.UUCP (Derek Zahn) (12/16/84)
> Vi is just impossible with the next generation of intelligent terminal.
I bet then that vi will be rewritten for this new generation of terminals
as soon as there is sufficient desire for it (even if it is done by some
energetic undergraduate somewhere as a semester independent study).
derek
--
Derek Zahn @ wisconsin
...!{allegra,heurikon,ihnp4,seismo,sfwin,ucbvax,uwm-evax}!uwvax!derek
derek@wisc-rsch.arpamark@cbosgd.UUCP (Mark Horton) (12/23/84)
> Vi is just impossible with the next generation of intelligent terminal.
I don't follow this reasoning at all. vi works fine on a Sun, on a 5620,
and on any reasonable intelligent terminal or workstation. Intelligence
normally includes the ability to handle a few escape sequences. I've
also used vi with a mouse, without modifying vi.
If your workstation is incapable of emulating a terminal, you will be
unable to log in over your network to another host, and unable to use
the rapidly growing library of screen oriented software. Such a
workstation may make an interesting research tool, but without a reasonable
amount of upward compatibility, it won't sell. After all, terminals sold
today are upward compatible with the model 33 Teletype.martillo@mit-athena.ARPA (Joaquim Martillo) (12/26/84)
I do not know if the current blit software permits block moves of text from one blit window to another. That is I can be running more in one window and emacs in another. If I want to take a block from the more window and put it in the emacs buffer, I should be able to do so. If I am using vi and vi happens to be in command mode this action could be disastrous. There is also no sign in vi which tells which mode vi is in. This strikes me as a major flaw. Therefore vi is not upwardly compatible with the next generation of intelligent terminals which have decent software (unlike what might be available for the blit).
david@ukma.UUCP (David Herron, NPR Lover) (12/28/84)
Gee, he's saying the obvious. VI needs some work to help novices learn to use it better. i.e. It needs a display of the current mode, column and line number might be nice, it would definitely be nice to have it display the command you are typing as you type it. Then you end up with an editor that (in the words of Jerry Pournelle) "natters at you". Just can't please everybody I guess. At any rate, what would it help to have vi tell you what mode you were in. If you were on this blit and had more in one window and vi in another (a vi that told various status messages all the time). You want to cut some text from more into vi. Ok. You look at vi and say "Oh damn, it's in command mode, I have to get it into input mode". But you aren't in the right place...... You go into input mode, paste in the text, but it ends up in the wrong place. So you unpaste it, go to command mode, move elsewhere, go to input mode, and paste it again. No, VI still isn't right enough. You want to be able to move the cursor around freely in the text. Commands to the editor should be accompanied with a click on the mouse. Text typing should be able to happen at any time. EMACS is closer to that than vi. David Herron