USING-VI(7)            Miscellaneous Information Manual            USING-VI(7)

NAME
     Using vi – simpler tools

DESCRIPTION
     Happy new year and hello from vi(1)!  I'm in the mood to post something
     but not in the mood for “social” media.  This one will probably be short.

     Yesterday I was trying to work on sandboxing catgirl(1) (that's the IRC
     client I work on) with pledge(2) and unveil(2) on OpenBSD, as suggested
     by the maintainer of its port.  I've done similar things before, but only
     on server software rather than user software.

     Anyway I was in ssh(1) to my OpenBSD VM (sadly I don't currently have any
     hardware to run OpenBSD on) using my usual editor, which is nvim(1).  I'm
     honestly not very thrilled with what neovim is doing lately, but the
     cleaned up defaults make my configuration files happier.

     The real problem with nvim(1), though, is that it's laggy as hell on
     OpenBSD.  There is significant delay on every single keystroke, as if I'm
     typing remotely to a server on the other side of the world, but this is
     on a local VM!

     So I did the only reasonable thing: I typed :qa followed by vi.  The
     difference was astonishing.  Typing and editing suddenly felt physical
     again.  (I put that in italics even though I know it won't render.)  Not
     only was it a vast improvement over nvim(1) in ssh(1) in a VM, it was a
     marked improvement over nvim(1) running locally and natively.

     Now obviously vi(1) doesn't have all the bells and whistles of newer
     editors, but of course the core editing model that makes vim(1) and
     nvim(1) so good is there, and in purer form, I think.  The vi(1) manual
     page is feasible to just sit down and read, and learn everything there is
     to know about the editor.  I set up a basic configuration and got coding.

           export EXINIT='set ai ic sm sw=4 ts=4'

     After I finished my pledge(2) and unveil(2) patch, I was so pleased with
     vi(1) that I kept on using it yesterday and today for other work, and
     obviously to write this post.  Despite the lack of editor amenities, its
     responsiveness and simplicity are enough to make using it comfortable and
     perhaps cosy.  I'm not sure I'll ever use vi(1) full-time, but for now I
     am much less likely to launch nvim(1).

AUTHORS
     june <june@causal.agency>

Causal Agency                  January 11, 2021                  Causal Agency