Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!uwvax!oddjob!ncar!noao!grandi
From: grandi@noao.arizona.edu (Steve Grandi)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: MKS vi bug
Message-ID: <675@noao.UUCP>
Date: 28 Mar 88 14:07:14 GMT
References: <3706@killer.UUCP> <49@dcs.UUCP> <2031@mind.UUCP> <1579@loral.UUCP>
Reply-To: grandi@noao.arizona.edu.UUCP (Steve Grandi)
Organization: National Optical Astronomy Observatories, Tucson AZ
Lines: 33
Keywords: MKS Mortice Kern vi
Distribution:


I haven't notice the problems reported by others, but I do have a few
quirks to report.  

One of my vi idioms is to mark the beginning of a line with mz, then move
forward some number of lines and with the cursor at the beginning of a
line, delete the chunk of lines with d`z.  Using the vi from 4.3BSD, PC/VI
and Aztec's Z (the latter two both MS-DOS programs), the line the cursor
was on IS NOT deleted, using MKS vi, the line the cursor is on IS deleted.

I have also had MKS vi crash the PC a few times:  I was editing a big file
and had little free space on the disk for vi's temporary files.  More
often, vi would report a "write error on temporary file" or somesuch and
tell you to bail out quick, but more than once I could do nothing but
reboot.

Finally, one can place vi option variables in the EXINIT environment
variable or the ex.rc startup file.  Since I dislike tiny files that
clutter the disk, I would prefer to use the EXINIT variable.
Unfortunately, one must put strings such as "set wm=3" in EXINIT which is 
impossible with the standard MS-DOS set command since the equal sign
confuses the poor command.  If one uses the MKS shell, one can do the deed,
but with COMMAND.COM, other tricks are necessary (which I haven't quite
figured out!).

Nevertheless, I like MKS vi.  It is quick on startup, updates the screen
very quickly, is not outrageously large, does not require several files on
the disk other than the executable, supports full vi functionality (such as
filtering sections through MS-DOS commands), has a "job control" feature
and is a supported project. 
-- 
Steve Grandi, National Optical Astronomy Observatories, Tucson AZ, 602-325-9228
UUCP: {arizona,decvax,hao,ihnp4}!noao!grandi  or  uunet!noao.arizona.edu!grandi 
Internet: grandi@noao.arizona.edu    SPAN/HEPNET: 5356::GRANDI or DRACO::GRANDI