A.J.Mechelynck wrote:
I sense an attitude here that it's just the luser's loss if they
don't learn how to use Vim. Fair enough, but there should be a way
for a non-vi user to enter a command telling Vim "I'm one of those
95% of people who use a modern PC - please switch to a useful mode".
"Easy Vim" and mswin.vim were written for exactly that purpose, and
IMHO they cripple Vim to almost complete _un_usefulness. Vim is a
very powerful editor, but to be able to use it, you need at the very
least to understand the difference between Normal mode and Insert
mode. To use it like the fine tool it is, you need to study, just
like one needs to study to become a concert pianist. If you're "one
of those 95% of users who need to be led by the hand by their OS and
editor", and are too dumb for a modal editor, go use Notepad and
stop bugging us.
I accidentally said "mode" with the unintended suggestion that I was
whining about Normal mode etc. Sorry. I totally agree that a Vim
user has to work with Vim, and not try to pretend it is something
different. Normal and Insert modes are fine by me.
By a "useful mode" I meant a more accessible implementation of core
features. Take searching. Incremental search and global search
highlighting are sensational. But new users are going to want to
turn the highlighting off (gedit has a menu item for this). It's
obvious that most people are going to want a key mapping. So why not
provide a standard mapping? OK, I can understand that you may not
want the "standard mappings" enabled by default. So provide some new
command to enable them.
Why not just type ":noh" at the keyboard then, if you can't
use a mapping?
Are you suggesting this in the context of my proposal to improve
the experience for new Vim users, in order to popularise Vim?
There has to be an EASY way to turn off search highlights!
John
