Linux vi arrow keys broken in insert mode
LinuxVimViLinux Problem Overview
My arrow keys don't work in vi in insert mode at home, they just each insert a newline and a capital letter, like 'A'. Is there a way to fix that?
Linux Solutions
Solution 1 - Linux
I presume you're using vim as this is tagged as Linux. Try:
:set nocompatible
(You may want to configure your .vimrc with this by adding this command to it. Create a new .vimrc file if not already present in your home directory, run echo $HOME to check home directory path.)
Solution 2 - Linux
Ubuntu ships default with vim-tiny, which doesn't have all the bells and whistles that vim has.
Do a quick sudo apt-get install vim to get all the juicy features that everyone's talking about.
Solution 3 - Linux
:set term=builtin_ansi
fixed it for me. You can either paste that into vim while in escape mode, (bleep mode) or add it to the end of ~/.vimrc without the leading ":"
Solution 4 - Linux
vi does not support arrow keys in insert mode. Use vim. Although your vi may just be a link to vim, it may be configured to behave like the "original" vi and thus disables the arrow keys. Just invoke vim directly.
Solution 5 - Linux
Yet another variation: this problem appeared for me after some .vimrc changes. A concerted search eventually revealed that my clever re-mapping of ESC in normal mode was not a good idea. Removing it solved the problem:
" this is NOT something you want in .vimrc:
" In normal mode, hitting Esc turns off search highlights:
nmap <ESC> :nohl<CR> " Do NOT add this to .vimrc
Solution 6 - Linux
The only thing that worked for me was ":set term=ansi"
Solution 7 - Linux
I had same issue with arrow keys, but when I used did that set nocp or nocompatible then my backspace didn't work correctly
for some reason when I installed vim with
sudo apt-get install vim, vi didn't had any issues with arrows or backspace anymore
Solution 8 - Linux
I just had an issue with arrow keys after switching over to use git in .vim.
I have installed this repo - https://github.com/sunaku/.vim
and after digging around for an hour, I found that AutoClose plugin (which didn't like anyway) broke the arrow keys.
The plugin docs suggest that one should set set ttimeoutlen=100, but that didn't work for me! (using urxvt+screen or urxvt, and even xterm)
So I removed the plugin at the end.
Solution 9 - Linux
In WSL integrated terminal on VS Code, update the package and install the full package of vim worked for me.
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install vim
However, to make the arrow key works when I use conemu I have to add :set term=builtin_ansi on ~/.vimrc
echo ':set term=builtin_ansi' >> ~/.vimrc
Solution 10 - Linux
You might also want to try 'noesckeys'
Solution 11 - Linux
I had the same issue while using vim inside Windows 8.1 with Cygwin.
Solution worked for me is, just run the following command in your Cygwin terminal:
cp vimrc_example.vim ~/.vimrc
Solution 12 - Linux
In the command line write this:
EXINIT="set nocompatible"; export EXINIT