James B. Byrne wrote:

> I actually would prefer to use vi or vim on the HP3000 because that 
> is what I use on all of our Linux boxes.  However, I am having no 
> end of trouble ...

If I were inclined to use vi on MPE text files, I would probably
try a command file similar to the one below, keeping in mind to not
use the :w command in vi to write to a different filename than the
original one...

  parm filename
  xeq /bin/tobyte "-at !filename /tmp/!filename"
  setvar term, "hp2392a"
  xeq /bin/vi /tmp/!filename
  xeq /bin/frombyte "/tmp/!filename !filename"

Note, however, that I have not tested above for any "pitfalls".

At least, it should help with the MPE-record to bytestream format
conversion, as long as you do not attempt to edit files that have
been kept in NUMbered format by an MPE-ish EDITOR.

And... as long as you pass "filename" case sensitive & Posix style...

  :myvi /SYS/PUB/SYSSTART

The above "restriction" is for the tobyte/frombyte conversion.
It could probably be relaxed by adding CI functions like FINFO
with options "POSIXFULLFNAME" and/or "FULLFNAME" carefully, but
a user preferring vi would probably also live with POSIX names.

;-)

Lars.

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