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AStonesThrow · 2025-05-11 · Original thread
No, it is not.

Emacs may use the term "yank buffer" globally. vim does not: in vim, they are simply called "buffers". There is a command called "yank" because it is bound by default to "y" but this command is not the only way to place text into a buffer.

https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/learning-the-vi/9780596...

In X11, the text goes into the "[Primary] Selection" or the Cut Buffer[s].

https://www.xfree86.org/current/xcutsel.1.html

CUT_BUFFER0 is the default, and obviously there can be more with higher numbers. But when you're pressing the middle mouse button, you're typically pasting the PRIMARY selection. There has never, ever been usage of "yank" in X11 documentation.

chongli · 2020-07-01 · Original thread
I don't think so. I don't think vim was in any way lacking in productivity. I'm one of those weird people that actually really likes using plain vi though. I actually own the book [1] and I've read through it several times, trying to learn as much as I can about vi and ex commands. There's so much power there that a lot of vim plugins turn out to be unnecessary.

Others have tried kakoune and really loved it. I don't understand it. I really tried to figure it out, I just don't grok it.

[1] https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/learning-the-vi/9780596...

gbacon · 2019-08-29 · Original thread
Practice, practice, practice. The ORA book will help.

http://shop.oreilly.com/product/9780596529833.do

I have not watched it, but knowing what a brilliant speaker Damian Conway is, you’ll probably learn a ton and have a blast watching his Mastering Vim video.

http://shop.oreilly.com/product/110000687.do

Other Conway vim resources:

- Damian Conway on How I Vim: http://howivim.com/2016/damian-conway/

- OSCON 2013 talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHm36-na4-4

- Damian Conway’s vim setup: https://github.com/thoughtstream/Damian-Conway-s-Vim-Setup

chongli · 2017-03-26 · Original thread
This is also why I decided to use Keith Bostic's nvi [0], also known as vi from BSD. I got so tired of endless configuring and bikeshedding my own editor instead of getting work done.

Since I switched to nvi I've learned way more about the powerful features of the base editor as well as shell tools like grep, fzf, fmt, column, wc, expand, pdftotext, pandoc, make, git... With tmux I have easy access to any REPLs and man pages I need. The main feature of nvi I need over the original vi is unlimited undo, though ex command history and file name completion are nice as well.

Part of the inspiration for me to switch from vim (and spacemacs) down to nvi was this post on stack overflow [1]. When I really grokked the power of this system I picked up O'Reilly's book on vi and vim [2] and read every page of the vi and ex stuff. There is soooooo much you can do with this editor that doesn't require plugins yet people reinvent them, often in a less powerful/flexible way.

Since learning to be productive in nvi, it's going to be very hard to go back to those bigger, more extensible editors. The temptation for bikeshedding is too great... Oh, and learning to read code with syntax highlighting turned off is really nice. It helps you write more clearly since you aren't relying on the highlighting to help the reader.

[0] https://sites.google.com/a/bostic.com/keithbostic/vi/

[1] https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1218390/what-is-your-mos...

[2] https://shop.oreilly.com/product/mobile/9780596529833.do