Re: Upgrading or enabling features in vim
Erin Spiceland wrote: On Mon, 2007-01-15 at 15:39 -0800, Gary Johnson wrote: On 2007-01-15, Erin Spiceland [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Mon, 2007-01-15 at 14:55 -0800, Gary Johnson wrote: On 2007-01-15, Erin Spiceland [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I just got a new server and vim wasn't installed. I installed 7.0 from scratch, but there are some problems with missing features or features not working: 1. syntax highlighting doesn't work. It is turned on in vimrc but I haven't checked anything else. 2. using the arrows on the keyboard in insert mode puts A, B, C, or D and newline into the file instead of moving up, down, left, or right. 3. doesn't remember my command history 4. doesn't remember where I was in the file when I closed it. 5. only remembers 1 change, so I can't use the u command to undo more than 1 change. What can I do to fix these problems or enable these features? #5 indicates that, as Tim said, you have 'cp' set. But vim sets 'nocp' automatically when it detects and sources an initialization file named .vimrc or _vimrc. Therefore, it appears that your vimrc file is not being sourced, which would explain #1. Executing :version will show you where your vim is looking for its initialization files and :scriptnames will show you the initialization files vim actually sourced. Reading :help initialization will also help you understand what should be happening when you start vim and may help you track down the root problem. system vimrc file: $VIM/vimrc $VIM is set to /usr/local/share/vim but /usr/local/share/vim/vimrc doesn't exist, and a vimrc does exist in /etc. How can I change it to use /etc? There is something wrong with your installation. If vim had never before been installed on that server, then the only way for /etc/vimrc to have appeared was for your installation process to have created it. But if you configured vim to look for vimrc in /usr/local/share/vim, then that's where your installation process should have put it. The right place to put it depends on your system and where you want to put stuff and, if you are not the system administrator, where you are allowed to put stuff. You'll have to give us more details of your system and how you configured vim for us to sort this out properly. You wrote originally that there were some features missing or not working in this installation. That implies that you have used them before where they did work. How did you get them to work then? Did you have your own ~/.vimrc or just a system vimrc? If you had just a system vimrc and that is the file now in /etc, I would just move that file to /usr/local/share/vim. On the Unix systems where I have installed vim, I don't even have a system vimrc--I just use ~/.vimrc. There are also ways to set environment variables to get vim to look in other places for initialization files, but since you built this vim from scratch, it would be better for you to reconfigure and rebuild it to get it right, or at least self-consistent. The preferred replying style in the vim list is to put the quoted text on top and your reply underneath, so I have reformatted your reply to that style. Also, don't forget to reply to the list rather than to just the author of the message to which you are replying, so that everyone in the list can follow the discussion and help in solving the problem, or see that it has been solved. Regards, Gary Thanks for the tips. This server was supposedly a fresh install of RHE. I say that vim was not installed only because I tried to use it and got the bash command not found message. I downloaded the source from vim.org and did ./configure; make; make install. The machines I have used vim on before were always preinstalled with vim. I use FC6 at home and RHE on my other 4 servers. I've never worked with a vimrc or .viminfo before, except very minimally. The five things I listed in my original email were things that always just worked. I was very surprised to find vim was not installed this time. rpm -qa | grep vim shows that vim 6.3 minimal is also installed, but that isn't the one my system is using, because vim --version shows 7.0. Are there any configure options that I can use or is there an enhanced version that I might be used to? Should I reinstall? from source or rpm? Thanks, Erin To have Vim use a system vimrc located in /etc when compiled to use /usr/share/vim as the default location, just create a soft link from one to the other, as follows (in the shell): cd /usr/share/vim ln -sv /etc/vimrc Or you may want to disregard that /etc/vimrc totally. I suggest you create a .vimrc in your $HOME directory. As its initial contents, the line runtime vimrc_example.vim will do. (Then you may view $VIMRUNTIME/vimrc_example.vim at your leisure, to see what it does.) If and when you decide to tweak your Vim settings, you will add additional lines below this :runtime command, except that if
Re: Upgrading or enabling features in vim
On Mon, 2007-01-15 at 15:43 -0500, Erin Spiceland wrote: I just got a new server and vim wasn't installed. I installed 7.0 from scratch, but there are some problems with missing features or features not working: Just as a reminder, if you use :version you can find out what options vim was compiled with. This should help you enable features that you have on your existing servers, but might not have been compiled in on your new server. -- Evan Klitzke
Re: Upgrading or enabling features in vim
On 2007-01-15, Erin Spiceland [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I just got a new server and vim wasn't installed. I installed 7.0 from scratch, but there are some problems with missing features or features not working: 1. syntax highlighting doesn't work. It is turned on in vimrc but I haven't checked anything else. 2. using the arrows on the keyboard in insert mode puts A, B, C, or D and newline into the file instead of moving up, down, left, or right. 3. doesn't remember my command history 4. doesn't remember where I was in the file when I closed it. 5. only remembers 1 change, so I can't use the u command to undo more than 1 change. What can I do to fix these problems or enable these features? #5 indicates that, as Tim said, you have 'cp' set. But vim sets 'nocp' automatically when it detects and sources an initialization file named .vimrc or _vimrc. Therefore, it appears that your vimrc file is not being sourced, which would explain #1. Executing :version will show you where your vim is looking for its initialization files and :scriptnames will show you the initialization files vim actually sourced. Reading :help initialization will also help you understand what should be happening when you start vim and may help you track down the root problem. HTH, Gary -- Gary Johnson | Agilent Technologies [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Wireless Division | Spokane, Washington, USA
Re: Upgrading or enabling features in vim
On 2007-01-15, Erin Spiceland [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Mon, 2007-01-15 at 14:55 -0800, Gary Johnson wrote: On 2007-01-15, Erin Spiceland [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I just got a new server and vim wasn't installed. I installed 7.0 from scratch, but there are some problems with missing features or features not working: 1. syntax highlighting doesn't work. It is turned on in vimrc but I haven't checked anything else. 2. using the arrows on the keyboard in insert mode puts A, B, C, or D and newline into the file instead of moving up, down, left, or right. 3. doesn't remember my command history 4. doesn't remember where I was in the file when I closed it. 5. only remembers 1 change, so I can't use the u command to undo more than 1 change. What can I do to fix these problems or enable these features? #5 indicates that, as Tim said, you have 'cp' set. But vim sets 'nocp' automatically when it detects and sources an initialization file named .vimrc or _vimrc. Therefore, it appears that your vimrc file is not being sourced, which would explain #1. Executing :version will show you where your vim is looking for its initialization files and :scriptnames will show you the initialization files vim actually sourced. Reading :help initialization will also help you understand what should be happening when you start vim and may help you track down the root problem. system vimrc file: $VIM/vimrc $VIM is set to /usr/local/share/vim but /usr/local/share/vim/vimrc doesn't exist, and a vimrc does exist in /etc. How can I change it to use /etc? There is something wrong with your installation. If vim had never before been installed on that server, then the only way for /etc/vimrc to have appeared was for your installation process to have created it. But if you configured vim to look for vimrc in /usr/local/share/vim, then that's where your installation process should have put it. The right place to put it depends on your system and where you want to put stuff and, if you are not the system administrator, where you are allowed to put stuff. You'll have to give us more details of your system and how you configured vim for us to sort this out properly. You wrote originally that there were some features missing or not working in this installation. That implies that you have used them before where they did work. How did you get them to work then? Did you have your own ~/.vimrc or just a system vimrc? If you had just a system vimrc and that is the file now in /etc, I would just move that file to /usr/local/share/vim. On the Unix systems where I have installed vim, I don't even have a system vimrc--I just use ~/.vimrc. There are also ways to set environment variables to get vim to look in other places for initialization files, but since you built this vim from scratch, it would be better for you to reconfigure and rebuild it to get it right, or at least self-consistent. The preferred replying style in the vim list is to put the quoted text on top and your reply underneath, so I have reformatted your reply to that style. Also, don't forget to reply to the list rather than to just the author of the message to which you are replying, so that everyone in the list can follow the discussion and help in solving the problem, or see that it has been solved. Regards, Gary -- Gary Johnson | Agilent Technologies [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Wireless Division | Spokane, Washington, USA
Re: Upgrading or enabling features in vim
On 2007-01-15, Erin Spiceland [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
On 2007-01-15, Erin Spiceland [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
On Mon, 2007-01-15 at 14:55 -0800, Gary Johnson wrote:
On 2007-01-15, Erin Spiceland [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
I just got a new server and vim wasn't installed. I installed 7.0 from
scratch, but there are some problems with missing features or features
not working:
1. syntax highlighting doesn't work. It is turned on in vimrc but I
haven't checked anything else.
2. using the arrows on the keyboard in insert mode puts A, B, C, or D
and newline into the file instead of moving up, down, left, or right.
3. doesn't remember my command history
4. doesn't remember where I was in the file when I closed it.
5. only remembers 1 change, so I can't use the u command to undo
more
than 1 change.
What can I do to fix these problems or enable these features?
#5 indicates that, as Tim said, you have 'cp' set. But vim sets
'nocp' automatically when it detects and sources an initialization
file named .vimrc or _vimrc. Therefore, it appears that your vimrc
file is not being sourced, which would explain #1.
Executing :version will show you where your vim is looking for its
initialization files and :scriptnames will show you the
initialization files vim actually sourced. ...
system vimrc file: $VIM/vimrc
$VIM is set to /usr/local/share/vim but /usr/local/share/vim/vimrc
doesn't exist, and a vimrc does exist in /etc. How can I change it to
use /etc?
[...]
Thanks for the tips. This server was supposedly a fresh install of RHE.
I say that vim was not installed only because I tried to use it and got
the bash command not found message. I downloaded the source from
vim.org and did ./configure; make; make install. The machines I have
used vim on before were always preinstalled with vim. I use FC6 at home
and RHE on my other 4 servers. I've never worked with a vimrc
or .viminfo before, except very minimally. The five things I listed in
my original email were things that always just worked. I was very
surprised to find vim was not installed this time. rpm -qa | grep vim
shows that vim 6.3 minimal is also installed, but that isn't the one my
system is using, because vim --version shows 7.0. Are there any
configure options that I can use or is there an enhanced version that I
might be used to? Should I reinstall? from source or rpm?
Thanks for the extra info. I think I understand what's going on a
little better now. I just logged on to a system running Red Hat
Enterprise Linux ES release 3 (Taroon Update 8). It happens to have
vim installed on it in /usr/bin, but it also has /bin/vi. I ran
/bin/vi -u NONE (to keep it from choking on my ~/.vimrc), saw that
it was Vim-6.3.81, and executed :version. There I saw this:
Compiled by [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Tiny version without GUI.
...
system vimrc file: /etc/vimrc
user vimrc file: $HOME/.vimrc
user exrc file: $HOME/.exrc
fall-back for $VIM: /usr/share/vim
I think this is Red Hat's minimal vi that they include so that the
user has something to edit with even if /usr is not mounted. So
that's where your /etc/vimrc came from. I would just leave that one
alone.
I then ran /usr/bin/vim -u NONE, also Vim-6.3.81, and again
executed :version with this result:
Compiled by [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Huge version without GUI.
...
system vimrc file: /etc/vimrc
user vimrc file: $HOME/.vimrc
user exrc file: $HOME/.exrc
fall-back for $VIM: /usr/share/vim
So it appears that Red Hat uses the same initialization file for
both /bin/vi and /usr/bin/vim. I took a look at /etc/vimrc and
found that it contained the commands to set 'nocompatible' ('nocp'),
to restore the last cursor position when editing a file, and to set
the color commands for an xterm, among others.
The features you are used to having are not part of the default
installation of vim from vim.org. They are usually compiled into
the binary by the default configure and make process, but they must
also be configured and enabled in your initialization file(s). Red
Hat's vim rpm includes an initialization file but the default
installation of vim from vim.org does not. You have to provide
those yourself.
So, to get a vim with these features enabled, you could either:
- remove your current vim install and install the Red Hat vim
rpm instead, which knows to look in /etc/vimrc; or
- retain your current vim install and copy /etc/vimrc to
/usr/local/share/vim/vimrc.
HTH,
Gary
--
Gary Johnson | Agilent Technologies
[EMAIL PROTECTED] | Wireless Division
| Spokane, Washington, USA
