Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-lcc!lll-tis!ames!pasteur!agate!ig!uwmcsd1!bbn!bbn.com!cosell
From: cosell@bbn.com (Bernie Cosell)
Newsgroups: comp.editors
Subject: Re: Tabs and vi
Message-ID: <21132@bbn.COM>
Date: 24 Feb 88 16:21:25 GMT
References: <20655@bbn.COM> <2318@cognos.UUCP>
Sender: news@bbn.COM
Reply-To: cosell@BBN.COM (Bernie Cosell)
Organization: Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc., Cambridge MA
Lines: 26

In article <2318@cognos.UUCP> donw@cognos.UUCP (Don Walker) writes:
>
>2. You can't use the TAB key.
>
  Since I posted my original request I have pushed through and fixed
  things for myself.  As for dealing with tabcharacters in the document,
  there are two approaches: one (As Don mentioned) is to set ts=<large>
  the other is to set ts=8 (that is, just leave it alone).  If you do the
  former, then you'll do just as I had originally asked and NEVER get any
  tabs in your document, but if you ever inherit a doc that has them you're
  in for a BIG surprise.  I was going to cope with this just by having
  something bound to :%!expand or some such (I may still!), but since I share
  sources with folk who are not as picky about TAB chars, it'll drive RCS
  *wild* when I check the stuff back in, I really can't do the infinite-ts
  hack.  So i live with ts=8.

  BUT... here's the trick that has made my life MUCH MUCH better -- very
  simple, really:  (Insert enough ^V's to make it work! :-) --
     :map! <tab>  <space><space><space><space>
  It isn't as nice as having REAL soft tab stops, but it works REAL
  good!

  Thanks for all the advice!
   __
  /  )                              Bernie Cosell
 /--<  _  __  __   o _              BBN Labs, Cambridge, MA 02238
/___/_(<_/ (_/) )_(_(<_             cosell@bbn.com