Avoiding jagged text when pasting into vi?

Question

Although I have no problem using SecureCRT (5.1.2 build 274) to work from Windows and connect to PC's running Linux, I have a problem when connecting to an embedded Asterisk appliance that provides"vi" through BusyBox 1.4.1 (2008-03-10).

The issue I'm having, is that when I paste code into vi, the text appears jagged like this:

<?php                                                                                                                               
try {                                                                                                                               
        $dbh = new PDO("sqlite:./db.sqlite");                                                                                       
                $dbh->exec("CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS customer (id INTEGER PRIMARY KEY AUTOINCREMENT, name VARCHAR(255))");

Does someone what the problem is? Is there a way to reconfigure either BusyBox or SecureCRT so that I can paste successfully?

Thank you.

score 4 · Accepted Answer · answered Jun 10 '10 at 13:48

4

This is vi's auto-indent conflicting with the existing indentation. Activate paste mode before pasting.

<ESC>:set paste

NB: I usually use vim. It is possible that the feature doesn't exist in vi.

answered Jun 10 '10 at 13:48

Quentin

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I'm guessing when he said `vi` he actually meant `vim`. I cant think of any reason why people still using `vi` when backwards-compatible, superior and awesome `vim` is around. – Jeffrey Jose Jun 10 '10 at 18:48
He also mentioned BusyBox, which suggests an extremely limited (in RAM and CPU) environment (such as a consumer grade router). – Quentin Jun 10 '10 at 19:02
Thanks for the tip, but ":set paste" doesn't work on this minimal vi as part of BusyBox :-/ I'll see if I can recompile a newer version to solve this issue. – Gulbahar Jun 18 '10 at 07:56

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 10 '10 at 13:52

I'd guess you have smartindent or autoindent turned on. I used to do set si! and set ai!, but David Dorward's answer seems to have the same effect. (I'll have to remember that one. :) )

I think set ai is the only one in vanilla vi. If you want to force it to turn off, do set noai (set ai! just flips the state.)

Avoiding jagged text when pasting into vi?

2 Answers2