Vim comes with a lot of functionality, but a lot of them are not enabled by default. Put the following in the file ~/.vimrc for some useful configuration (double quote begins a comment in Vim configuration):
  set nocompatible          " disable vi-compatible behaviour
  filetype plugin indent on " enable functionality based on file type
syntax enable
set autoindent
set incsearch
set laststatus=2
set mouse=a
set expandtab
set number
set scrolloff=5
set shiftwidth=0
set smarttab
set tabstop=4
" enable syntax highlighting
" automatic indentation
" jump to next match when typing during search
" always show status line
" enable mouse support
" use space for indent
" show line numbers
" always show 5 lines before / after cursor
" use value of tabstop for indent
" tab / backspace adjusts indents
" width of a tab / indent