vi editor question

[Derek Brown]

Is there a way, while in vi, to see the file with all of its control codes included .... ie carriage returns, tabs etc ?

Many thanks

[baiju_3]

For tabs and carriage retuns ,use

:set list

Control characters , not sure.

thx,
bl.

[Rodney Hills]

If you use "vim", the "-b" option allows you to edit a binary file.

HTH

-- Rod Hills

[A. Clay Stephenson]

Not really. You can use Ctrl-V to escape control characters to allow you to input non-printable values there is no reliable mode to allow the display of non-printable characters. The first obvious problem is that now that LF's would not be handled, your entire file would be just one line long.

You can use the standard od or xd commands to display the data in human-readable form. Man od for details.

If you actually need to edit binary data, one of the best tools is hexedit.

http://gatekeep.cs.utah.edu/hppd/hpux/Development/Tools/hexedit-1.2.10/

[Derek Brown]

excellent... thank you

[Andrew Merritt_2]

Another way to do this is to use 'vis' and 'inv' to process the file before and after editing. This will let you see and edit any control characters.

Andrew