diff --git a/chapter08/vim.xml b/chapter08/vim.xml
index 030c50442..0a1af29be 100644
--- a/chapter08/vim.xml
+++ b/chapter08/vim.xml
@@ -71,10 +71,13 @@
     <para>Now run the tests as user <systemitem
     class="username">tester</systemitem>:</para>
 
-<screen><userinput remap="test">su tester -c "LANG=en_US.UTF-8 make -j1 test" &amp;> vim-test.log</userinput></screen>
+<screen><userinput remap="test">su tester -c "TERM=xterm-256color LANG=en_US.UTF-8 make -j1 test" \
+   &amp;> vim-test.log</userinput></screen>
 
     <para>The test suite outputs a lot of binary data to the screen.  This can
-    cause issues with the settings of the current terminal.  The problem can be
+    cause issues with the settings of the current terminal (especially while
+    we are overriding the <envar>TERM</envar> variable to satisify some
+    assumptions of the test suite).  The problem can be
     avoided by redirecting the output to a log file as shown above.  A
     successful test will result in the words "ALL DONE" in the log file
     at completion.</para>