Warp wrote:
> Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
>> I was responding to what you actually wrote, rather than what you might have 
>> thought you intended to mean. You said you don't start up vi, edit a file, 
>> then save and quit. That's just how vi works.
> 
>   Then you must be using a different version of vi than I do.

No. You start vi with a file, edit it and insert text, and then save it.

It's just that "typing letters" isn't how you insert them, any more than 
using H J K and L are how you move around inside an emacs session.

>   I start vi with eg. a text file, try to start editing it and... weird
> things happen. Nothing happens, it beeps or does weird things.

Right. You need to go into "insert text" mode. You can configure your vi to 
start that way, but most people don't, since most people don't start editing 
by having the first thing they do to be inserting text.  (I.e., most times 
you start vi, you already have the file you're changing.)

Maybe it's because I use vi a lot, so when someone says "you can't start 
with a file, move the cursor, edit text, and then save the file", I'm not 
assuming they meant to add "without having to learn what keystrokes do 
that."  It's not like you can move the cursor, edit text, and save the file 
in emacs without either using a version with menus or learning that C-n is 
down and C-p is up and so on.

Given that there *are* editors where you can't open a file when you start 
the editor, or that you can't move around arbitrarily in the file (because 
it's syntax-directed editing or something), I thought maybe you meant 
something like that.

>   I think I explained that in parentheses in my post.

vi does everything you described. It just doesn't use the "usual" keys to do 
it. Later versions do indeed let you use the arrow keys, and prompt you to 
save the file when you close the window, and even have standard menus on top 
and such.  The original VT100 version doesn't, of course.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   There's no CD like OCD, there's no CD I knoooow!

Post a reply to this message