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The values of Emacs, the Neovim revolution, and the VSCode gorilla

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Re: The values of Emacs, the Neovim revolution, and the VSCode gorilla

#41

Post by indy »

elagost wrote: post #9

This is really well written and researched but confuses me. Do most people not do this - make choices based on values (and constantly re-evaluate those choices in the face of new information)? When I decide to use software, move to a new location, purchase cereal at the grocery store, buy music, and a variety of other daily activities, these are choices I make based on my values. Many times I end up picking something…

Most people are creatures of habit. Once they make a decision ("this is my brand of toothpaste") they tend to stick to that in spite of any new information.

Re: The values of Emacs, the Neovim revolution, and the VSCode gorilla

#42

Post by uncledave »

indy wrote: post #41
elagost wrote: post #9

This is really well written and researched but confuses me. Do most people not do this - make choices based on values (and constantly re-evaluate those choices in the face of new information)? When I decide to use software, move to a new location, purchase cereal at the grocery store, buy music, and a variety of other daily activities, these are choices I make based on my values. Many times I end up picking something…

Most people are creatures of habit. Once they make a decision ("this is my brand of toothpaste") they tend to stick to that in spite of any new information.

There's one exception to that which is that it's sometime more fortuitous to throw energy into developing something you already know further rather than throwing all existing knowledge away and starting again on a whim.

Re: The values of Emacs, the Neovim revolution, and the VSCode gorilla

#43

Post by antonvs »

spamizbad wrote: post #2

A thoughtful essay. I find myself frustrated with Sublime Text these days, and as a former (novice) vim user, I’ve been debating if I should go for VSCode like all the young guns these days or commit to Doom Emacs to leverage a solid initial setup and my vim memory and fully embrace libre route, which are a little more aligned with my values (although not to the degree of RMS). I remain oddly indecisive.

I'm an old gun (learned to program in Fortran in 1977), and I recommend giving VScode a try.

Its barrier to entry is very low, so you don't need to invest a lot of time to find out whether it's going to be productive for you. It's a real usability jump over older IDEs.

I've switched from a combo of, mostly, Intellij IDEA and Vim to almost exclusively VScode (for development). I do still use Spacemacs just for org mode.

> my vim memory

There are vim compatibility plugins for VScode.

> fully embrace libre route

VScode is open source and MIT licensed, here's the repo: https://github.com/microsoft/vscode

Someone would need to explain to me what values I'm forgoing in order to use this. Although I should warn that someone I'm likely to have a strong rebuttal.

Re: The values of Emacs, the Neovim revolution, and the VSCode gorilla

#44

Post by antonvs »

intarga wrote: post #26
antonvs wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't achieve what a modern IDE can do using a simple editor and the command line. Autocomplete, hinting, type checking, navigation, documentation display, automated refactoring, interactive debugging, and integration with other tools like test runners and databases, are some of the major features which yes, are indeed force multipliers. This all becomes even more important when working on large codebases, and/or…

You can do all of those things in all four of the editors discussed.

The comment I replied to was asking about comparing those kinds of editor to "basic editors (e.g., gedit) and reaching for grep/sed/etc when I need something fancy." You certainly can't reasonably do most of those things with that toolset.

Re: The values of Emacs, the Neovim revolution, and the VSCode gorilla

#45

Post by qppo »

submeta wrote: post #30

When you finally learn to master and config Emacs, you run circles around all other editors. Emacs is so much more than just an editor. But even if you only use it for coding: Magit is the best git client I have used in years (coming from PyCharm + Git Tower App, which is nice), then there‘s Ztree-Diff (excellent folder diff tool; previously using Kaleidoscope app), then Eshell for interacting with the server from wi…

You can do all that and more in vscode as well... you just have to "learn to master and config" it with your own plugins in JS. It's not that hard.

Re: The values of Emacs, the Neovim revolution, and the VSCode gorilla

#46

Post by oblio »

elagost wrote: post #9

This is really well written and researched but confuses me. Do most people not do this - make choices based on values (and constantly re-evaluate those choices in the face of new information)? When I decide to use software, move to a new location, purchase cereal at the grocery store, buy music, and a variety of other daily activities, these are choices I make based on my values. Many times I end up picking something…

No, they don't. You're an exception. Most people choose based on practicality or price. Free = even better.

I find that one of the few places where people act based on their values is raising children. And even there, a lot of people skip raising their children completely.

For everything else: convenience, price, maybe risk.

Re: The values of Emacs, the Neovim revolution, and the VSCode gorilla

#47

Post by rusk »

tpush wrote: post #10
elagost wrote: post #9

This is really well written and researched but confuses me. Do most people not do this - make choices based on values (and constantly re-evaluate those choices in the face of new information)? When I decide to use software, move to a new location, purchase cereal at the grocery store, buy music, and a variety of other daily activities, these are choices I make based on my values. Many times I end up picking something…

Most people's moral values don't concern text editors, or software in general.

Software developers aren’t most people

Re: The values of Emacs, the Neovim revolution, and the VSCode gorilla

#48

Post by Datenstrom »

antonvs wrote: post #25
pedrocr wrote: post #14

Are powerful editors really that much of a force multiplier? My career path has pulled me from a CS degree into loosely related fields so I mostly only code as a hobby. I end up using basic editors (e.g., gedit) and reaching for grep/sed/etc when I need something fancy. Is having that power in the editor versus the command line that much of an advantage?

You can't achieve what a modern IDE can do using a simple editor and the command line. Autocomplete, hinting, type checking, navigation, documentation display, automated refactoring, interactive debugging, and integration with other tools like test runners and databases, are some of the major features which yes, are indeed force multipliers. This all becomes even more important when working on large codebases, and/or…

My vim configuration, environment, and screen splitting using tmux giving me CLI tools in other windows together gives me every single feature you listed and more. My shell and environment being Turing complete not counting vimscript I imagine it would be hard to find anything a IDE could do that I can not.

For reference: https://gitlab.com/datenstrom/home

Edit: just saw your response to the sibling reply didn't realize you included (enhanced) Vim in IDEs as I haven't heard of it referred to as one before, quite the opposite usually.

Re: The values of Emacs, the Neovim revolution, and the VSCode gorilla

#49

Post by erostrate »

oblio wrote: post #46
elagost wrote: post #9

This is really well written and researched but confuses me. Do most people not do this - make choices based on values (and constantly re-evaluate those choices in the face of new information)? When I decide to use software, move to a new location, purchase cereal at the grocery store, buy music, and a variety of other daily activities, these are choices I make based on my values. Many times I end up picking something…

No, they don't. You're an exception. Most people choose based on practicality or price. Free = even better. I find that one of the few places where people act based on their values is raising children. And even there, a lot of people skip raising their children completely. For everything else: convenience, price, maybe risk.

And tech people tend to be much more willing to spend time&effort "optimizing" their choices to fit their values than the average population. At least for "small to medium" choices - not sure about raising children.

Re: The values of Emacs, the Neovim revolution, and the VSCode gorilla

#50

Post by antonvs »

aprdm wrote: post #17

Our text editor is a tool, there’s no fundamental value in a tool vs the other, they do not possess life. They’re tools like a fork is a tool. I wonder what of the things you use in the day to day you analyze so deeply, your microwave ? The forks you buy? Might be an interesting exercise of thought but for something that I use to make money, I will use the best tool available for the job, thank you very much.

> there’s no fundamental value in a tool vs the other

> I will use the best tool available for the job

The article is pointing out that the way you decide which tool is best depends on values that you have, which is certainly true whether or not you consciously think about or recognize those values.

Describe your decision process for selecting the best tool in a given scenario, and the values you use should become clear.

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