What is Digg?203 Comments
- FearlessFreep, on 10/11/2007, -3/+49Is this digg trying to get back some geek cred after all the Paris Hilton news stories?
- GMorgan, on 10/11/2007, -1/+33Once you've used Emacs you never go back.
Mainly because you can't hold down enough modifier keys to exit unless you have twenty fingers. Emacs doesn't have users, it has prisoners. - st0nes, on 10/11/2007, -3/+34Use it for a month or so and it becomes second nature; I've been viing for about 15 years now and can even edit my dreams in vi.
- kevinmtu, on 10/11/2007, -4/+32Still one of the best text editors out there once you know the basics
- toolegittoquit, on 10/11/2007, -1/+25vim is pretty sweet. It's funny to see the KDevelop guys impotent when they ssh into some machine and there isn't X forwarding available.
- mapkinase, on 10/11/2007, -0/+18YOu should marry her
- inactive, on 10/11/2007, -0/+18I don't understand how people can compare editors like nano (or pico) to editors like vi and Emacs. Of course nano is intuitive and simple; it barely has any functionality. There is nothing wrong with that if you're a user who is just has to make a quick fix in the terminal but doesn't do much real text editing.
But if you edit text every day, especially code, you need more power and more speed. You need vi. - lordtyros, on 10/11/2007, -5/+21Aw, snap, here come the emacs lovers.
GAME ON! - MonkeyBoy87, on 10/11/2007, -5/+20Vi has two modes. the mode that you make mistakes in and the mode that beeps at you.
- mcm297, on 10/11/2007, -2/+17Outside of the operating system itself, it's probably the computer program that I've used the most in my lifetime.
- trghpy, on 10/11/2007, -15/+30ever since i found nano, I've never looked back at vi or emacs
God forbid text editing to be intuitive... - ace77, on 10/11/2007, -2/+17"To me, vi is Zen.
To use vi is to practice zen.
Every command is a koan.
Profound to the user,
unintelligible to the uninitiated.
You discover truth every time you use it."
-- reddy@lion.austin.ibm.com - Niten, on 10/11/2007, -0/+14But once you get past the basics, there's a lot you can do in Vi that isn't nearly as efficient in other editors. Say I see something on line 204 that I want to change: I just type "204G" and I'm there. If I want to replace the next three words in a sentence it's "c3w". Going to the closing brace in a C program is as easy as "%".
You can certainly accomplish these things by various means in any editor, but in Vi it can be done much more directly and without messing around with the arrow keys (much less the mouse). After a while, all that saved time starts to add up... - thcobbs, on 10/11/2007, -1/+15step 7. close nanno
step 8. turn off computer
step 9. get pen and paper you damn young 'uns! - MrSketch, on 10/11/2007, -0/+13vi is intuitive, you just have to change your intuition.
- redfan, on 10/11/2007, -5/+18Nice editor if you're on a system that has room for little else. Confusing as hell to any newbie though.
- longwa, on 10/11/2007, -1/+14This article barely even scratches the surface of what vi can do. If you only want to open a file and make a few small changes, might as well use something simpler. It's only once you learn all the harder stuff that you begin to see a huge boost in productivity.
- Niten, on 10/11/2007, -0/+13Last week I finished an IM conversation with one of my friends and she accidentally typed ":wq" to me (to close her Adium window I suppose).
At least she didn't do ":q!"! - ShadowGT, on 10/11/2007, -5/+18Voila, In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran, cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the vicissitudes of Fate. This visage, no mere veneer of vanity, is a vestige of the vox populi, now vacant, vanished, as the once vital voice of the verisimilitude now venerates what they once vilified. However, this valorous visitation of a by-gone vexation, stands vivified, and has vowed to vanquish these venal and virulent vermin van-guarding vice and vouchsafing the violently vicious and voracious violation of volition. The only verdict is vengeance; a vendetta, held as a votive, not in vain, for the value and veracity of such shall one day vindicate the vigilant and the virtuous. Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose vis-a-vis an introduction, and so it is my very good honor to meet you and you may call me "vi"
- Niten, on 10/11/2007, -0/+12I think one of the best reasons to learn Vi (even moreso than its high productivity value) is just because there's sure to be a Vi implementation on absolutely any Unix machine that you login to. Heck, even OS X ships with Vim...
- GMorgan, on 10/11/2007, -0/+12No Vi is great. Is it difficult to learn? Yes. Is it faster than comparable editors once learned? Indisputably.
When you code for any length of time you want the fastest way of manipulating text possible. They have spent ages inventing new development tools but still the most important function is simply the ability to type as fast as possible. Vi facilitates that more than any other editor. You need to move your hands away from the red zone far less in Vi than in other editors and that makes it astonishingly fast to use. - dantidote, on 10/11/2007, -0/+11I swear to god, digg keeps reading my mind. I just installed Ubuntu server like an hour ago, and have no clue what i'm doing in VI.
- Niten, on 10/11/2007, -0/+10What's so sad about it? I'm in with mcm297 here.
Say I want to put some pictures up on my web page? I SSH in and use Vim. Write some code so I can get paid? Vim. Email an old buddy? Mutt and Vim. Ask a question on Usenet? SLRN and Vim. Write an entry in my journal? Vim.
Vi (Vim in particular) is, in my opinion, the single most important application on any of my computers. - schestowitz, on 10/11/2007, -4/+14Great editor, steep learning curve. Still, better than clicking and drooling like a caveman. Language (VR or commands) are faster than pointing devices because they are more expressive. Search YouTube for "vi powa".
- arbulus, on 10/11/2007, -1/+10Nano is defintely much easier for a beginner. At least with Nano, you have some idea of what to do if you've never used it before. If you've never used VI(m) before, you type in "vi /path/filename" and you're completely ***** lost. You need a manual just to know how to insert text. That's not to say it's not a powerful editor, because it is, it simply doesn't guide you or help you out whatsoever.
- stauken, on 10/11/2007, -0/+9He probably makes more money than you now, and made more money than you do now when he started working. People don't use vi because it's a happy-happy fun-time experience. Sorry buddy.
- Niten, on 10/11/2007, -0/+9Vi's learning curve:
http://markshroyer.com/files/learning-curves.jpg
(Not originally from my site, I just didn't want to sap somebody else's bandwidth. Don't know original author.) - thcobbs, on 10/11/2007, -0/+9"ESC ESC ESC ESC ESC ESC... xxxxx wrong mode? "
No wonder you can't get laid..... you don't know where to put your fingers - inactive, on 10/11/2007, -4/+12Dude.. digg lost it's geek cred back in 2005 when the myspacers took over.
- GMorgan, on 10/11/2007, -0/+8Emacs also has two modes. Towers of Hanoi mode and RSI mode. Fortunately Emacs can be extended to bring RSI's to all areas of computer use.
//edit - it's ironic that Emacs creator suffers from arthritis thanks to what he has unleashed on the world.// - CAPSLOCKISCOOL, on 10/11/2007, -0/+8Heres a cheat sheet for the commands:
http://www.viemu.com/vi-vim-cheat-sheet.gif - trollick, on 10/11/2007, -2/+10Well, if this does not get me laid, I don't know what will.
- GMorgan, on 10/11/2007, -0/+7That's one example. Every move command can be combined with the delete command in Vi. If you can move there you can delete to there.
This works on lines, paragraphs, words, pages, blocks etc.
That's only scratching the surface as well.
The other benefit of Vi is that it is a standard. Every Unix has a Vi and there isn't a worthwhile IDE out there that doesn't have a Vi plugin. You can learn one set of powerful editor commands and they will work everywhere. - pxa270, on 10/11/2007, -0/+7Almost every guide tries to explain Vi(m) in terms of two or more modes, which makes it more complex than necessary. I've alway found it more useful to think of Vi in terms of only one mode, the command mode. That is, in Vi you give commands to the editor in the form of letters. Two of those commands, i(nsert) and a(ppend) are commonly used to add new text, and those command are terminated with Esc. I haven't had any confusion about different modes once I approached the interface from this viewpoint (and made it a habbit to automatically terminate the insertion commands with Esc).
- SocialPoison, on 10/11/2007, -0/+7Vim and emacs run in a terminal.......
- quentinmcalmott, on 10/11/2007, -1/+7That's like saying you should walk everywhere you go because you have to put out effort to learn how to drive a car. It might be fine if I'm going next door, but if I'm going to work, I'm not going to walk 20 miles.
- NinjaBoy, on 10/11/2007, -1/+7Step 10. Quit writing and take a nap instead.
- Niten, on 10/11/2007, -0/+6I think they're using the term "Vi" not specifically to talk about the original Vi text editor, but just as a generic name for the family of text editors inspired by Vi proper; Vim is a Vi editor, nvi is a Vi editor, Elvis is a Vi editor, and so on. At least, that's how I took it.
- cabazorro, on 10/11/2007, -2/+8I'm teaching 3rd and 1st graders vi.
vi The_Adeventure_of_Alice_in_Wonderland.txt
:%s/nonsense/&/gn
7 matches on 7 lines
They say it that makes sense. - inactive, on 10/11/2007, -0/+6vi is hard edged some times. just do a sudo apt-get -y install vim
- FearlessFreep, on 10/11/2007, -6/+12That's one of the saddest things I've read today
- GMorgan, on 10/11/2007, -1/+7GVim supports use of the mouse as well. As do all the various Vi plugins for the main IDE's out there.
- kefler, on 10/11/2007, -0/+6@FearlessFreep: Why is that sad? Would it be better if he spent most time with WoW or IE on www.myspace.com? Atleast he is saying most of his computer-using time is spent using a program that gets work done.
- Beakerz, on 10/11/2007, -2/+8I prefer my Etch-E-Sketch.
- Niten, on 10/11/2007, -1/+6You're ignoring the difference between learning curve and productivity. In the long run, learning Vi(m) is the *easy* way to go because eventual gains in productivity more than make up for the initial week or so of difficulty.
I don't want to put out any more effort than necessary when using my text editor. That's why I use Vim. - sonicvanajr, on 10/11/2007, -1/+6This is pointless. It's basically a recap of everything vimtutor teaches you.
- Urusai, on 10/11/2007, -10/+15vi was designed by a guy having to work over a 110 baud acoustic coupler modem. Surely we've advanced a little since then?
UNIX: Because everything was already invented in the '70s. - bruenig, on 10/11/2007, -1/+6Even your examples show how much better vi is. Shift + down three times + ctrl C, as opposed to 3dd. Not only is it less keystrokes to type 3dd, but you get to keep your hands where they ought to be, no fishing for the down key and then moving the hands back to the keyboard and having to hold down modifiers like shift and control.
- TehDoctor, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5vimtutor.
- emiller, on 10/11/2007, -4/+9repost.
:q! -
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