vim & active backspace key

[tony j. podrasky]

O/S: RedHat 3.0 AS

The BACKSPACE key works fine under
all other applications.

When I use the backspace key is
always active: if I position the cursor on a line, and press the backspace key, it begins deleting text. Not only that, but it deletes text to the right of it, not to the left.

How can I make it inactive during visual mode,
and delete text to the left during insertion mode?

regards,
tonyp

[Stuart Browne]

Within 'vim', if you type 'set', what its the setting 'backspace' set too?

As 'backspace=2' on my system, it will move the cursor in non-edit mode, and delete-char-to-left in insert mode.

[tony j. podrasky]

Hey Stuart;

It is set to backspace=2.

I found that the problem was with the
terminal environment: somehow instead of ^?.

When I changed that, all was well.

It sure is great having several LINUX boxes handy with difference revs of the O/S.

I just U/G'd to RH 3.0 AS from RH 6.1 - only because the ancient Netscape browser was choking on .asp pages.

regards,
tonyp

[Steven E. Protter · Accepted solution]

Check stty -a

Check your backspace settings in /etc/profile and or .bash_profile

See if the results are consistent with other telnet/ssh clients, remote and local.

I am using the same release of Red Hat to type this post and DO NOT have the same results.

Maybe I accidentally got something right.

SEP

[tony j. podrasky]

Hi Steve;

Yes - that's where I found the difference.

I don't know what caused it to be messed up. It could be an anomoly that happened when I switched from BASH to TCSH.

Thanx for the input.

regards,
tonyp