vi, getting multiple "Sorry, the command is not available in this version..." after reinstall

Solution 1:

Try from within vim ...

:version

and if your get ...

Small version without GUI.

You are missing package vim-gui-common. It is probably also advisable to install vim-runtime. Commands to install:

sudo apt-get install vim-gui-common
sudo apt-get install vim-runtime

Another cause might be that alternatives is pointing to the wrong one:

update-alternatives --display vim

to show what is used and ...

update-alternatives --config vim

to change to another vim. It could be that /usr/bin/vim.gnome is used and you need /usr/bin/vim

edit: Michael Durrant fixed it with #1 in case anyone wonders.

You probably don't have the full version of VIM installed. To check, try executing vim or:

readlink -f `which vi`

For example, Ubuntu 16.04 LTS only came with /usr/bin/vim.tiny

Install the full VIM:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install vim

Now you should have /usr/bin/vim.basic, and the .vimrc commands should succeed.