Vim is great
============

For some reasons I  still use the Vim editor [1]  version 6.1. The main
reason  is that  this  particular version  is the  fastest  on my  IRIX
computers (it is from the SGI Freeware collection and the GVim uses the
Motif libraries). On 175 MHz or oven on 250 MHz CPU is does matter.

But I have here  the Vim 7.x (and even 8.x on the  SGI Indigo). The 7.2
is somewhat slower and the 8.x  is considerably slower (on the poor odl
Indigo with its 33 MHz CPU there is no other option: the Vim 5.1 is WAY
TOO OLD - it even does not support  vertical split - and the 8.0 is the
only other version available). The 7.2  comes from the NekoWare (it was
created by SGI  fans from the now dead Nekochan.net)  and the GVim uses
the Gtk+ (which is ugly, slow but functional on the IRIX).

The 7.x and 8.x versions are one big advantage over the older 6.x ones:
the spell checking functionality.

It it pretty easy to use:

---------------------------------
:set spell
---------------------------------

And typing errors  are highlighted. The default language  is English (I
assume that it is the variation of  English which is used in US). It is
what I use here at SDF. Well,  I should put the command into the .vimrc
file because I usually forgot to turn it on...

But my  (less or more) native  language is Czech.  So I have to  use an
another commmand:

---------------------------------
set spelllang=cs
---------------------------------

And I there is no necessary file in the ~/.vim/ directory then Vim will
asks if  the it can download  the file (or files)  from the ftp.vim.org
[2]. It works even on as strange  system as the IRIX 5.3 is... (as long
as the "cur;" utility  is available). I'm not sure if  it is secure but
it is really user-friendly.

The Vim takes care about file encoding. For Czech language I can use
or the Latin  2 encoding (ISO 8859-2) or the  UTF-8. There are available
files for both encodings and the Vim will download the right one.

Don't tell me that this is not great!


References:
[1] http://www.vim.org
[2] ftp://ftp.vim.org/pub/vim/runtime/spell/