USING NVI IN 2026

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| tl;dr                                                            |
|                                                                  |
| nvi remains a perfectly valid editor in 2026 when used as part   |
| of a simple Unix workflow. It does not aim to replace modern     |
| editors, but to provide a predictable and minimal environment.   |
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OVERVIEW

There is a common assumption that modern development requires
modern editors, plugins, and IDE-like features.

But in practice, that is not always true.

I use nvi as part of a simple workflow:

    st + screen + nvi + coreutils

And it works perfectly fine.


BACKGROUND

nvi was not written to improve vi.
It was written so vi could survive.

BSD needed a legally clean implementation that behaved exactly
like the original editor. The goal was compatibility, not innovation.

Because of that, nvi remains:

    - predictable
    - minimal
    - stable


WORKFLOW

Many of the features people expect from modern editors can be
replaced by combining simple tools:

    grep, find, sort, column, wc, make, git

Additional tools such as fzf, fmt, or pandoc can be integrated
naturally when needed.

The editor becomes just one component of the system, not the center.


ADVANTAGES

This approach has some advantages:

    - no plugins
    - no breakage after updates
    - works on any Unix system
    - encourages understanding instead of abstraction


LIMITATIONS

This is not for everyone.

Some workflows benefit from IDE features and automation.
Terminal multiplexers (tmux or screen) are typically used to
complement this workflow.


CONCLUSION

For many tasks — system administration, scripting, debugging,
text processing — nvi is more than enough.

Using nvi in 2026 is completely fine.


REFERENCES

Inspired by a comment by chongli on Hacker News (2017-03-26):
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13959104

Bob Beck explains why vi should remain vi, while users who want Vim
should invoke vim explicitly. He also highlights the value of
consistent traditional vi behavior across Unix systems:
https://marc.info/?l=openbsd-misc&m=115820462402673


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Last Modified: 2026-07-26 01:45:45 UTC