how to backspace in vi 2551
No. It uses ^H for help. That is the problem. That meant that emacs users fought the use of ^H for...
It has *nothing* to do with Linux. And your following "history" is a fascinating bit of imagination, but virtually *all* *wrong*.
Self-contradiction is not explication. You should have said: Yes! You are right about Emacs, but please note that that necessarily means that Emacs' developers contributed to the conflicting usage...
I can't figure out what you meant to say there. Regardless, Emacs does *not* use ^H for backspace, it uses ^B.
What came from DEC terminals was the use of ^? for Delete (not for BackSpace).
That's as clear as mud. Originally the VT100 had *no* key at all labeled "Delete" or "Backspace". Other keyboards typically placed a "Backspace" key just above the "Return" key. DEC added a...
We might note that there are *three* different keys being discussed, and you are apparently confusing all of them! On a typical PC,
Key Typical Keycode
CNTL H 008 Delete 033 3 ~ BackSpace 177
On VT-100 terminals, which are often considered the "common denominator" for terminal emulation, the "Delete" key sends177, which is ^?. That *must* be available as one possible software configuration, even if the PC keyboard is not the same.
Lets see...
ASCII first standardized in 1963, contains no BS.
EBCDIC "standardized" by IBM, uses026 for BS.
ASCII BS (-008) added in 1965.
Obviously ASCII was *not* "in opposition" to EBCDIC, which didn't yet exist. ASCII didn't use the same code for BS, though BS was added to ASCII after EBCDIC was released. (Note also that IBM contributed to the development of ASCII.)
Bill Joy wrotevi-... starting in 1976.
It might be worth noting thatvicame about because Bill Joy had a brand new ADM-3A terminal, and that is *far* from being a DEC terminal!
A *large* and *intelligent* group (which clearly includes Linus Torvalds) understands that just because Bill Unruh never uses anything but a PC keyboard does not mean that defines the whole world, and has (thank goodness) rejected the small group of idiots who would remove compatibility with non PC hardware.
Linux actually has nothing to do with it. The Linux kernel doesn't care what you use. The keyboard driver can make it anything you like, but by default comes configured for a PC's keyboard. And we might note that ^H, BackSpace, and Delete are three *distinct* keys on a PC keyboard, each with a different scancode. You of course are free to configure the keycodes to be whatever you like...
Why not simply configure your system to use the hardware you have attached to it?
The only battle is with people beating their heads against the wall rather than learn how it works, and why. You may thing all of that is useless because it doesn't match *your* PC... but wait until you have a use for a vt-100 emulator over a dialup modem or some other simular example!
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