Vim 7.2 hangs on startup, "killall vim" fixes it
vim
Solution
Well, I found the answer:
:help -X
shows that Vim tries to connect to the X11 server on startup to get clipboard functionality and other stuff, which can lead to a "long startup time when running Vim in a terminal emulator and the connection to the X server is slow"
There are three ways to resolve this issue:
- Starting Vim with "`vim -X`" disables this X11 communication
- Calling "`unset DISPLAY`" also disables the X11 communication
- If Vim is compiled without the "`+X11`" feature, this communication will not take place
I went for "`unset DISPLAY`" since I've been getting other strange error messages, and now vim starts all but instantly. I also tested the -X parameter, which resolved the problem as well (even with the DISPLAY parameter still set).
Problem
I just compiled vim 7.2 on a Linux server (in my user dir, since the server had vim 6 installed and I wanted to upgrade but do not have root privileges). When I enter "vim", it hangs on startup without any response, but when I call "killall vim" from another ssh window, startup completes and vim seems to work fine after that. Why would that be, and how can I fix it? Many thanks for your responses.