*help.txt* For Vim version 7.4. Last change: 2016 Sep 07 VIM - fake help file for vim-tiny The Vim online help is not installed on this Debian GNU/Linux system. WHY ? Because only the "vim-tiny" package is installed, whose sole purpose is to provide the vi command for base installations. As such, it contains a minimal version of Vim compiled with no graphical user interface and a small subset of features, in order to keep the package size small. Since the "vim-runtime" package is rather huge when compared to "vim-tiny", installing the latter does not automatically install the former. HOW TO GET A BETTER VIM To get a more featureful Vim binary (and a vim command, rather than just vi), install one of the following packages: vim, vim-nox, vim-athena, vim-gtk, or vim-gtk3. HOW TO OBTAIN HELP either browse the Vim online help via web starting at http://vimhelp.appspot.com/help.txt.html#help.txt or ask your administrator to install the "vim-doc" package, which contains the HTML version of the online help and browse it starting at /usr/share/doc/vim/html/index.html or ask your administrator to install the "vim-runtime" package, re-run vi and access the online help again. Note that all the above mentioned Vim variants other then "vim-tiny" automatically install the "vim-runtime" package. If you don't suffer from disk space shortage using one of them is recommended.