SUSE vi <> Debian vi
 

I have been using SUSE for years and never had this problem. I also had this problem with Ubuntu when I tried it out, it drove me nuts.

If I use VI and let's say I want to add something to the end of the makefile, like to enable bots. I hit "end" to go to the end of the line. I hit "i" to do an insert, but it does not insert at the end of the line, always one character before the end of the line. I notice other quirkiness on the keys, not just that one. What am i doing wrong ?

I'm not sure this is the right place to ask for vi support.

In any case, "i" is the vi insert command which inserts before the character under the cursor. The command you are looking for is "a" which is append and will insert after the character under the cursor.

The only case where "i" should not insert before the last character on a line is if the line was empty to begin with.

Yep.

Also, shift-a will edit at the end of a line no matter where you are in the line. So if you are at the beginning of a line and you want to put something at the end, shift-a and voila! Likewise shift-i will do the same at the beginning of a line.

Thanks. I know this is not a VI support thread, it was just a quick question. I imagine most of the people in this sub forum use VI or have used it in the past.

In debian (or ubuntu), use vim in place of vi ;)
That same and that work, that the only clue i found !

VI is one of those necessities of life. As much as I hate it, it is the most useful "tool" on any linux operating system once you learn its power.

I think most modern distros have now replaced vi with vim. At least on Fedora this seems to be the case as with most of the other distros I've used.

Indeed. If you use *nix at all, vi is your friend. I know folks that have tried to live with using the gui text editor from the desktop, but to me if you are making small changes, vi is so much faster. Using regular expressions to make bulk changes is a VERY nice feature as well. It's a very powerful tool once you learn how to use it.