Re: default editor

[Alan Shutko <ats@acm.org>]

Will Yardley <you@aredumb.com> writes:

> The patch (to init.c) seems to be:
>
>    Tempdir = safe_strdup ((p = getenv ("TMPDIR")) ? p : "/tmp");
> -  Editor = safe_strdup ((p = getenv ("EDITOR")) ? p : "vi");
> +  Editor = safe_strdup ((p = getenv ("EDITOR")) ? p : "/usr/bin/editor");
>    Visual = safe_strdup ((p = getenv ("VISUAL")) ? p : Editor);

Either I'm blind, or that should obey VISUAL if set, otherwise
EDITOR, otherwise /usr/bin/editor....

[installs mutt, tries
EDITOR="echo EDITOR" VISUAL="echo VISUAL" mutt ats@acm.org
]

Hmm... the Debian unstable package seems to work as expected for me.
Sure you don't have something weird in your environment or something?

> Alan Shutko <ats@acm.org>:
>
>> Some programs use VISUAL, some EDITOR, some both... the distinction
>> between them has long been lost.
>
> Perhaps, but EDITOR is supposed to be your line editor, and VISUAL your
> full screen editor, or at least that's what I've always been told.

Sure.  But that distinction hasn't really been meaningful for at
least a decade, and people writing programs these days don't
necessarily follow it.

-- 
Alan Shutko <ats@acm.org> - I am the rocks.
Looking for a developer in St. Louis? http://web.springies.com/~ats/
I got lost in a nursery once. - Richie Ryan