If you ever wondered why Vim uses hjkl for arrow keys...

I tend to use Vim as my editor of choice.  Even when using Visual Studio, I do so with the ViEmu plugin.  I have always wondered why the directional keys were hjkl instead of jkl;.  The latter are the home keys for the right hand.  The former are not and overload the right index finger.  Thanks to Hacker News, I now know the answer.  The terminal which Bill Joy wrote the original Vi on was an ADM-3A and that had arrows drawn on the hjkl keys (see the link for a picture).

Comments

• Anonymous
  March 09, 2012
  Reminds me of the "Mom I remembered to cut off the ends of the turkey" story. www.snopes.com/.../secret.asp