Skip to content

xoreaxeaxeax/vimmmex

 
 

Folders and files

NameName
Last commit message
Last commit date

Latest commit

 

History

5 Commits
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Repository files navigation

vimmmex : a vim execution engine

Overview

vimmmex is an illustration that a turing machine can be built from copy/paste/search/replace style operations, informally showing the turing-completeness of regular vim commands. we limit ourselves to only the "normal" vim commands - that is, vim "ex" commands (those commands that begin with a colon) and vimscript are avoided, as these are already powerful, and showing their turing completeness is trivial. specifically, vimmmex implements a brainf@!# interperter with vanilla vi commands.

Usage

to use the interpreter, open the file vimmmex in vanilla vim. if possible, reduce the font size so that the entire file fits on the screen - this will make observing execution easier. press gg2yy@" to launch the interpreter. the default BF program calculates prime numbers, up to 100. the numbers will appear on the output line (below "_o:") as they are calculated. calculations are performed by copying and pasting characters while moving about the file through searches and cursor movement keys.

Demonstration

Calculating prime numbers
vimmmex
... while tracking the cursor movement
vimmmex

Versions

the vimmmex_raw file contains (non-ascii) vim special characters, such as ^M and ^R. vimmmex provides a pure-ascii version of the interpreter, in which special characters are inserted by the execution process itself, but uses an (ideally forbidden) vim "ex" command (the first line) to perform the substitution. this may be more conducive for copying and pasting the contents of the file.

Limitations

the only non-vi compatible requirement is that "whichwrap" is set to at least "b,s" - this is the default for vim, and is automatically configured when "nocompatible" is set. this requirement is only in place for aesthetics, as it allows breaking one long line into several smaller lines.

Author

vimmmex is a proof-of-concept from Christopher Domas (@xoreaxeaxeax).

About

The vim execution engine

Resources

License

Stars

Watchers

Forks

Releases

No releases published

Packages

No packages published