cyboman, Tue 2011-06-14 @ 12:44:51-0700: > i'm not new to vim but somewhat confused about this. what is the > difference between buffers and windows in vim? and is it significant?
A buffer is (normally) bound to a file, and represents the state of that file in memory, which may or may not be the same as the state of the file on disk, depending on whether the buffer has been edited since it was last loaded/written. A buffer is not really a visible UI element; it is the abstract notion of the state of a text file. A window is a rectangular area of Vim's UI that displays the contents of exactly one buffer (or part of it, if the buffer contents can't fit within the bounds of the window). Multiple windows may simultaneously display the same buffer. For a given window, you may switch which buffer is currently being displayed by using, among other things, the `:b‥` family of commands. Taking it further, a particular arrangement of windows forms a "tab page", and multiple tab pages may be opened, each with its own window layout, each window bound to some open buffer. I feel like I could probably word that better, but that's the clearest explanation I can come up with at the moment. -- You received this message from the "vim_use" maillist. Do not top-post! Type your reply below the text you are replying to. For more information, visit http://www.vim.org/maillist.php
