Okay, easiest way to reproduce 1) Start rxvt 2) run vim 3) Insert some text and then try to use backspace to delete it At first, I thought it might be an ncurses bug, but joe doesn't exhibit the same behavior, yet is also linked to ncurses. This bug was not present in 6.0, appeared in 6.1, and is still present in RawHide.
It was a problem with the xterm termcap description in ncurses. Get the current packages for ncurses, termcap, rxvt, XFree86* and it'll work.
I just tried it on my box running piglet, same result. The packages of termcap, ncurses, rxvt, XFree, and vim are all newer in piglet than rawhide, yet I still don't have working backspace in vi in an rxvt.
I know. The bug resolution "rawhide" usually refers to our internal tree, from which rawhide is built every couple of days. It's fixed there - so it'll be fixed in rawhide as soon as a new rawhide is built.