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Ask HN: Could VSCode be the new Emacs?

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Re: Ask HN: Could VSCode be the new Emacs?

#21

Post by jbverschoor »

qsort wrote: post #2

A Unix novice came to Master Foo and said: “I am confused. Is it not the Unix way that every program should concentrate on one thing and do it well?” Master Foo nodded. The novice continued: “Isn't it also the Unix way that the wheel should not be reinvented?” Master Foo nodded again. “Why, then, are there several tools with similar capabilities in text processing: sed, awk and Perl? With which one can I best practic…

"Everything is a file"

Unix is an OS for I/O streams / lines. That's what it's good at. That's what the tools are designed for.

Re: Ask HN: Could VSCode be the new Emacs?

#23

Post by kryptiskt »

Visual Studio Code extensions are run at an arms-length from the core editor in an ExtensionHost sandbox. The OG Electron editor Atom is much more suitable as a 21st century Emacs architecture-wise, it allows extensions free reign. There is a big cost to this, it has suffered a lot of performance and upgrade compatibility problems stemming from this, so it's not strange that VS Code made the choices it did.

Practically speaking, now that VS Code extensions can present web views, they can be arbitrarily powerful as long as they don't need to mess with the editor's internals that is not exposed by the extension API. So making things like a mail reader or pixel editor is fine. Rearranging the whole UI is not.

Re: Ask HN: Could VSCode be the new Emacs?

#24

Post by rbonvall »

virgilp wrote: post #7
qsort wrote: post #2

A Unix novice came to Master Foo and said: “I am confused. Is it not the Unix way that every program should concentrate on one thing and do it well?” Master Foo nodded. The novice continued: “Isn't it also the Unix way that the wheel should not be reinvented?” Master Foo nodded again. “Why, then, are there several tools with similar capabilities in text processing: sed, awk and Perl? With which one can I best practic…

I am familiar with sleep, but I haven't used the other two UNIX commands yet. I've still got a long road to enlightenment.

Don't worry. eat and drink are just old commands, but rewritten in Rust.

Re: Ask HN: Could VSCode be the new Emacs?

#25

Post by arvinsim »

saurik wrote: post #19
kortex wrote: post #11

I think so, but prepare for people to come out of the woodwork with all kinds of reasons why their workflow is the _one true way_. Some people like customizing the heck out of their editor, getting super deep into metaprogramming and macros. Personally, I don't really have time for that. I want an editor which does 95% of what I want out of the box. For me, that's pycharm, but vscode is really nice as well. It feels…

> Some people like customizing the heck out of their editor, getting super deep into metaprogramming and macros. You will hopefully be programming for decades: I have been programming already for three decades and I expect I will be programming for another two before my mind gives out (if I am lucky, I might get another four). Customize your tools: they are yours, and being able to continue using and improving your w…

If I work on different environments or desks, customization is the last thing I want. I would rather have sane defaults and start being productive immediately.

Re: Ask HN: Could VSCode be the new Emacs?

#26

Post by dvh »

Google is evil, everybody knows that (now) but young players don't know that Microsoft is also evil. Always was, always will be. Don't touch anything that Microsoft touched, you'll only get burned.

Re: Ask HN: Could VSCode be the new Emacs?

#28

Post by praptak »

dataflow wrote: post #10
qsort wrote: post #2

A Unix novice came to Master Foo and said: “I am confused. Is it not the Unix way that every program should concentrate on one thing and do it well?” Master Foo nodded. The novice continued: “Isn't it also the Unix way that the wheel should not be reinvented?” Master Foo nodded again. “Why, then, are there several tools with similar capabilities in text processing: sed, awk and Perl? With which one can I best practic…

Are these fill-in-the-blank parables of some sort (or parodies perhaps)? I feel like I've seen every kind of story put in this format. Is there some historical context that makes these interesting?

This is the historical context: https://terebess.hu/zen/Mumon.pdf

Why it is historically and culturally significant: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gateless_Barrier

Re: Ask HN: Could VSCode be the new Emacs?

#29

Post by doniphon »

TL;DR It is already, for the good and for the bad.

probably the best thing that come from Microsoft in decades

update: has momentum, a huge marketing budget (helps) and the cost of entry way lower than emacs' one (typescript ecosystem a fair bit less exotic than lisps').

performance is OK, really. i remember more than 20yrs ago when one had to use vi, micro emacs and lesser options because emacs was then the resource hog. at same age / stage vscode is way less hungry than emacs then...

Re: Ask HN: Could VSCode be the new Emacs?

#30

Post by funklute »

mih wrote: post #18

Does VSCode offer a terminal user interface? With Emacs/Vim I can SSH to a remote machine and immediately start editing with muscle memory using the same keystrokes as in the GUI. Sure VSCode has its strengths and as an IDE easier to get started and work with, especially for newcomers. That said, the fact that it requires a desktop environment to operate in means there are niches that Emacs fills which VSCode current…

> Does VSCode offer a terminal user interface?

Yes, but it's very buggy, and tends to drop both connections and characters all the time. If you're doing heavy terminal work you need an external terminal.

EDIT: actually I realised you were probably talking about running headless, whereas I was thinking of an integrated terminal. I don't believe vscode can run headless.

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