VIM tutors and my alias

The VIM tutorial was happily not too hard to follow. I found the assignment instructions for Unit 3 clearly spelled out and straightforward. In a sense the assignment instructions are a good case study for how Linux commands, options and arguments must be precisely constructed if good things are to happen. Each assignment this week builds on the preceding assignment, in much the same way that a Linux command line is fashioned from discrete simple elements and routines. When apparently simple Linux commands are attached to one another in the right order they can produce a very powerful but finely distilled computational expression that is extremely efficient. After going through the first vi/VIM lesson this week I also have a better appreciation for some of the issues described by Neal Stephenson in his essay “In the Beginning was the Command Line.” Stephenson describes vi as a minimalist text editor. No Baroque formatting, fonts or doodads allowed. The version of vi that we used this week is called VIM which stands for Vi IMproved. It was rolled out in the early 90's and is now the most popular text editor for Linux professionals. VIM adds a lot of features that are more user friendly like mouse support and more commands. But overall VIM is plainly Zen.

However, getting acquainted with the modal nature of VIM is not easy. If one is not careful, toggling between the VIM insert and command modes can quickly deteriorate into a ping pong match where it is easy to slide into disorientation and confusion. Somehow, sort of like learning to ride a bike, I found myself regrouping after each stumble and got the hang of it. At least enough to type out a simple paragraph of text. Hoorah! In our reading Stephenson explains that the text editor is how source code, which is only ASCII text, gets written. The source code talks through a compiler to the object code and the linker forges this input into an application. In other words, learning to use a text editor is fundamental to getting technology to do what you want it to do. Conceptually this sort of makes sense, I guess, but my journey to enlightenment will be long with lots of twists and turns ahead. Or at least until mid-August.

Switching between the functions of the I key from the insert function to a simple letter of text was my toughest challenge while using VIM. I liked the concept of using the alias command to make VIM commands easier to remember and more intuitive. And with so many new commands and functions to remember, learning to use VIM will be a heavy lift. Perhaps the alias feature will help.

Any time I've had to configure something on my PC either at work or at home it has always been a chore. I guess plug and play hasn't been my general experience. I've found uploading digital photos from my camera to my PC to be slow and cumbersome with lots of clicks and menus. Wondering if somebody hasn't written a line of Linux that could speed up the whole process and make it easily repeatable? Something to investigate. Until next time....