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From: dillon@CORY.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon)
Newsgroups: net.micro.mac
Subject: Re: VI features, Editors, etc...
Message-ID: <8610022020.AA28814@cory.Berkeley.EDU>
Date: Thu, 2-Oct-86 16:20:32 EDT
Article-I.D.: cory.8610022020.AA28814
Posted: Thu Oct  2 16:20:32 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 4-Oct-86 06:41:31 EDT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: University of California at Berkeley
Lines: 70

>When I found out that vi 3.9 understood function keys and had
>showmode (puts an I in the lower right corner when in insert
>mode, R in Replace, r in replace), I thought "neato!" but after
		...
>The main problem with VI from a screen editor point of view is that it
>is really a line-oriented screen editor:
		...

>	Forward and back word (b & w) go around lines, but forward and
>	back character don't.  Also, forward word gets stuck at the end
>	of a line if it ends with a space.
		...
>	Vi always wants the cursor to be on top of a character, instead
>	of between characters, so you can't have a 0-length buffer, and
>	empty lines look like lines with one space (the only easy way to tell
>	them apart is to do an "x" on the line and see if it beeps).
		...
>	The newline character is a magic cookie.  I can't point the cursor
>	to it, and I can't treat it like a normal character.  Therefore,
>	because you can't "x" it, vi has another random command:  Join.
>	This is the crux of the problem.

>The other problem is that it is NOT a WYSIWYG editor:

>	You type any change command (c,C,etc) and you get this
>	funny $ at the end of the changed region and the $ and the
>	text you changed aren't really there.  *Many* times I've had
>	novices use the C command and hit spaces to the end of the line
>	because they wanted to get rid of text that they didn't know
>	was already "gone".

Touchy Touchy.  You have a very sharp definition of what a WYSIWYG editor
is.  And even if VI weren't, I doubt it would be a problem. 

What your basically saying here is that you don't like VI because it isn't
a wordprocessor.  Well, your right, it isn't.  Your also correct in that
it is difficult learn vi for the average user.  VI was never meant to be
a user-friendly editor.  What it IS is an editor that allows you to do just
about anything short of WYSIWYG-word-processing (another field entirely).
It allows the EXPERIENCED user to work extremely fast... faster than even
the most experienced user could ever work with a mouse-based editor.
(Don't give me any hash about cursor positioning... that's only a very small
part of the big picture).

Mouse-based 'user friendly' editors are all an well, but completely useless
once you get experienced.  At the outset, the 'user friendly' mouse-based
editor is easier to learn, but you get to a point where you simply cannot
go any further (you know everything there is to know, you are typing/
moving the mouse as fast as you can), and when you get to this point, the 
VI user has the advantage because HIS limits are quite a bit higher than
yours, and thus he can get things done faster.

Not only that, but user-friendly editors have virtually NO programmability.
Programmability implies things that you cannot do with a menu-driven editor.
True Programmability allows the experienced user to do almost anything he
wants.  The ultimate in programmability is EMACS.  Theoretically EMACS
supercedes even VI. (Here I'm talking about a fully configured EMACS, not
micro-EMACS).  The only reason that VI is on par with EMACS is that some
programmers LIKE the command-insert modes and do not like EMACS control
sequences.  The EMACS people, of course, have the oposite opinion.

Lately, we have seen combination editors on the market... which have
Menu and Mouse, but still base the editor on the keyboard.  These types
of editors are getting more popular as they are both easy to learn, and
have extremely high limits once you do get experienced.  I think that is
where the generic 'EDITOR' will go in the future.  Apple's "idiot box"
idea just isn't making it en` ToTo.

					-Matt