Re: [Nmh-workers] Ditch autoconf selection of pager?

[Paul Fox]

chad wrote:
 > 
 > On 14 Jan 2013, at 14:05, Paul Fox <address@hidden> wrote:
 > 
 > > ken wrote:
 > >> 
 > >> Ok, this means I get to ask a question of greybeards that I've always
 > >> wondered about.
 > >> 
 > >> What is the deal with VISUAL and EDITOR?  I always set EDITOR; I've never
 > >> set VISUAL.  I've never understood what the difference is.  I'm fine with
 > >> making the hierarchy Editor: -> $VISUAL -> $EDITOR (and I think a default
 > >> of 'vi' is fine), but I've always wondered why there are two environment
 > >> variables.
 > > 
 > > not all terminals were capable of doing the cursor addressing needed
 > > for any given screen-oriented editor.  so the user was given the ability
 > > to configure two editors -- likely "ed" and "vi", though some folks may
 > > have used emacs or "se" :-).  some programs had separate commands for
 > > invoking the two.  (for instance, see ~e and ~v in the mailx man page.)
 > 
 > I used one of these regularly, with mh, on a Palm V with an early
 > cellular modem, around 1998-2000 or so.  I really doubt there are
 > people doing this any more.
 > 
 > As a matter of practical old-fogey-ness, I wonder if people regularly
 > use nmh on systems where vi isn't vim.
 > 

<cough>vile<cough>

but maybe that's just me.  ;-)

=---------------------
 paul fox, address@hidden (arlington, ma, where it's 42.4 degrees)