Subject: Re: vi changed for the worse??? (or broken?)
To: Mason Loring Bliss <mason@acheron.middleboro.ma.us>
From: John Nemeth <jnemeth@cue.bc.ca>
List: current-users
Date: 03/19/1999 03:34:40
On Mar 18,  8:04am, Mason Loring Bliss wrote:
}
} This could be my imagination, but vi seems to be behaving differently after
} last night's build. To wit, one of the things I do a *lot* is:
} 
} o[ESC]O[RETURN]
} 
} This always used to work fine. Now, I get a beep when I hit the uppercase
} "O" if I do it too soon. This is intensely frustrating.

     This is because vt100 cursor keypads have two different modes of
operation.  In one mode the cursor keys send '^[[A' to '^[[D' and in
the other mode they send '^[OA' to '^[OD'.  This presents a problem,
since all of the aforementioned characters do something on their own.
The way vi distinguishes between these characters being cursor keys
and them being individual commands is by intercharacter timing (this
is a really terrible way to write a user interface).  Anyways, what
this means is that you have a termcap that specifies the usage of the
latter set of characters.

}-- End of excerpt from Mason Loring Bliss