Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site gitpyr.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!gatech!gitpyr!robert From: robert@gitpyr.UUCP (Robert Viduya) Newsgroups: net.bugs.4bsd Subject: Re: Interesting vi bug/feature Message-ID: <414@gitpyr.UUCP> Date: Wed, 12-Dec-84 00:01:03 EST Article-I.D.: gitpyr.414 Posted: Wed Dec 12 00:01:03 1984 Date-Received: Thu, 13-Dec-84 02:47:18 EST References: <1705@umcp-cs.UUCP> <64@mit-athena.ARPA> Organization: Georgia Tech, Atlanta Lines: 36 >< > 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.