vi(m)
vi (often ex-vi or nvi) is a command-line text editor. Vim (VI iMproved) is an extended version, that many people use as an entire IDE. vi and vim share the same basic commands and keyboard bindings, so if you just learn the basics, you’ll be fine no matter what kind of ancient or modern system you log into.
The nice thing about learning vim is that you can use it locally on your laptop, or remotely on a server, and the editing experience is exactly the same (beautifully efficient) in both places.
Vim is a modal editor, meaning that the same keys do different things depending on which “mode” you’re in. For example when you’re in insert mode, your keypresses will simply be written into the file (or buffer) you’re editing – much like your IDE or Microsoft Word. However in normal mode, pressing those same letter keys will execute whatever keybinding they are tied to. Once you’ve adjusted to that idea – “modal editing...
