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Ask HN: Programmers who don't use autocomplete/LSP, how do you do it?

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Re: Ask HN: Programmers who don't use autocomplete/LSP, how do you do it?

#611

Post by p4bl0 »

Wow, I didn't think I'll read something like this before years. It's a bit sad to be honest. I'll give the same advice I give to my students: force yourself to code using only Nano as your editor. It has plenty of editing features (line numbering, syntax highlighting, auto-indent, multiple buffer, keyboard macros, etc.) and those should be more than enough if you do known how to program. You're of course allowed a browser for the documentations and a shell to interact with other tools: interpreters, compilers, git, etc.

Just like it's good to be able go somewhere by actually reading a map and following street indications if you don't have access to digital map app and/or a GPS, it's good to be able to code without depending on tools that actually do the work for you. It's true for an IDE if you don't know how to navigate source code or how to build your project without it. It's even more true for stuff like copilot which actually write code for you…

Re: Ask HN: Programmers who don't use autocomplete/LSP, how do you do it?

#612

Post by zkry »

daltonpinto wrote: post #99

This question reminds me of the first time I met a blind programmer. I asked him how he managed to code, and he replied with something that stayed with me: a good programmer should organize software in such a way that every piece of code has a clear and logical place. The organization should be so intuitive that anyone could build a mental model of the structure and navigate it easily, even without seeing it. It felt…

This is a great tie in point. I've had simmilar feelings that a lot the conveniences we have as developers only end up letting us dig ourselves into ever deeper messes of complexity.

Re: Ask HN: Programmers who don't use autocomplete/LSP, how do you do it?

#614

Post by throwaway81523 »

crabbone wrote: post #344
throwaway81523 wrote: post #139

I use Emacs and sometimes I open a window to bring up a man page or code definition for some function, but I've never felt the need for a fancy IDE. You just get used to what is going on in the code. Like if you are a fiction writer and you're asked to write a new Star Trek episode, after watching a few existing episodes you would get familiar enough with the characters and milieu to not need to refer to the series b…

For years now Emacs had integration with LSP. The experience isn't quite the same as VSCode (I think, there are some proprietary extensions to LSP protocol, or some such, but don't quote me on this). But it's good enough to work in most cases (this is how I write in Ada and Rust, for instance). So, if you use Emacs: https://github.com/joaotavora/eglot I believe this is the most popular implementation.

I had thought LSP was basically an editor-independent way to implement language editing modes. Since I mostly use languages Emacs already has modes for, I haven't pursued LSP, but I figure that it's there if I need it. Thanks.

PS, I would be interested in seeing a serious Ada vs Rust comparison by an actual fluent user of both.

Re: Ask HN: Programmers who don't use autocomplete/LSP, how do you do it?

#615

Post by zkry »

chikere232 wrote: post #487
troupo wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Text search will also find commented out usage, docu, changelog, and my .org file with refactoring ideas from last month Yes, when searching across the entire project for text an instant fuzzy search is an invaluable tool. > It will also show when a class with the same method names exists elsewhere Oh, this is a great example when a code -aware tool is better. I also ave a rant-ish about LSP at the end. So, let's s…

You seem weirdly angry that some other people like to work in a different way than you like to work. People like different things. You still get to like your thing.

I 100% use LSPs and other modern tooling, but I find it weird as well too. Like, if I found out a favorite author of mine wrote everything on paper first I'd find that amusing and quirky.

Obviously a developer not using LSPs can be competitive against someone who doesn't (though that's not always the case).

Though if someone is truly bothered by others tool preferences, they should take comfort in the thought that if things really are as they believe, then these people should be driven out of a job for failing to keep up with the times. "Great," you should think, "one less person of competition on the market."

Re: Ask HN: Programmers who don't use autocomplete/LSP, how do you do it?

#617

Post by jpeggtulsa »

sly010 wrote: post #494
continuational wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good riddance? Why spend your life doing something a computer could do for you? The goal of programming is not to write code (however much I enjoy that part), it is to solve problems. I don't think copilot et al is anywhere close yet though. They are occasionally useful when working with popular APIs you use very rarely, or when you need to write some very repetitive code. Other than that, I feel like it's mostly a m…

> The goal of programming is not to write code (however much I enjoy that part), it is to solve problems. Right, which is exactly why autocomplete is not a huge help.

That makes no sense whatsoever. Autocomplete helps you speed up the writing of the code so you can focus on solving the problems more often.

Re: Ask HN: Programmers who don't use autocomplete/LSP, how do you do it?

#619

Post by max6zx »

bitwize wrote: post #539
max6zx wrote: post #96

Not sure about others who commented in this post, but all guys I met in real life who refuse to use advanced features of an IDE like autocomplete, refactoring ... are either: 1) have never work in a truly large scale projects (and usually familiar only with weak type languages - which IDE cannot help much so they cannot grow over a certain limit - chicken and egg?). 2) do not know what are the differences between a r…

There is some low-key ableism in comments like this. Not all of us have our productivity enhanced by videogame shit happening in our field of vision while we're trying to code, or by software tools attempting to get ahead of us and do or check our work while we're typing. These things are distractions, and the price of distraction, especially for people with certain forms of neurodivergence[0], is very, very steep, n…

Regarding the distraction, IDE can also turn off most of the features that you do not need to let you free from distraction, so you do not have to use Notepad, vi or ed to avoid idstraction.

When you say you work with very large projects, do you mind sharing an estimate of how many LoC (a poor metric, but still), language and contributors your project has? From my experience, when you do not have problem with bulk refactoring, either your project is not big enough, or do not have many change or no so many contributors so that any kind of replacement with review is not a significant issue. In these cases, it's hard to see the benefit of features offer by IDE/LSP. Just like when do you see bubble sort and quick sort have similar performance? When there is only a few items in the list.

And finally, I also an Emacs user, so I ask you to experiment one thing: instead of using find-grep, try consult-ripgrep and see what improvement it offers compare to find-grep. And remember that an IDE can do even better than that.

Re: Ask HN: Programmers who don't use autocomplete/LSP, how do you do it?

#620

Post by nsteel »

xigoi wrote: post #592
brabel wrote: post #565

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> vscode to do all of the automation, keypresses become more and more sluggish The problem is VS Code then. Try IntelliJ, they spent ridiculous amounts of engineering to make typing as fast as Vim. > I find when it pops up automatically to be maddening. Me too, the first thing I do in my IDE is disable that. I love autocompletion, but I want it only when I need it. Now, that's completely different from just saying I…

> The problem is VS Code then. Try IntelliJ, they spent ridiculous amounts of engineering to make typing as fast as Vim. I presume that does not apply on an old laptop with 8 GB of RAM.

I'm not sure I understand what you're saying there, but in a discussion about being maximally productive, old laptops with 8GB of RAM just don't come into the equation.
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