Comment 13 for bug 491615

Anatoly, Vim runs in 'compatible' mode by default. This isn't specific to vim-tiny. The way that you change this is by creating a ~/.vimrc file. The mere presence of this file tells Vim that you know you're using something other than vi and it changes the option to 'incompatible', allowing you to use arrow keys in insert mode.

The difference with vim-tiny is that it is solely targeted at base installs (which are typically run by sysadmins as they're setting up the system). Because of this, we only install the binary under the name vi, not vim. Also, we ensure that it runs in 'compatible' mode.