I you want to learn vim movements quickly, start using a browser plugin with vim keybindings like VimFX it Vimium. Stop using the mouse to browse the internet. You'll get hours of practice doing something you'd do anyway. The muscle memory will be there when you open vim. Also, turn off arrow keys in vim. Vim is keyboard and home row centric, all else follows. Also doing dojo exercises like on commandlinefu.cim helps.
Show HN: I built an online interactive course that helps you learn Vim faster
121–130 of 283 posts
Re: Show HN: I built an online interactive course that helps you learn Vim faster
#122My (issue?) with vim is that I've been using it so long, all day every day, that I can't remember any of the commands - I only have muscle memory.
If someone asks me how to do something, I have no idea, I have to physically pretend like I'm doing it on a keyboard to figure out the command.
Re: Show HN: I built an online interactive course that helps you learn Vim faster
#123Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even though, admit it... If the course is really good, the extra $10 are nothing compared to the several hours of frustration that you could save.
Or save all frustration and just don’t use vim ;-)
I've used vim for many years now. It is true, learning vim makes it very frustrating when you find yourself having to use another editor. Luckily, vim is pretty much everywhere so those situations are rare.
Re: Show HN: I built an online interactive course that helps you learn Vim faster
#124Can someone please explain to me why I should learn vim? I've made several attempts in my lifetime because I thought there would be some magical "ah-ha" moment, but it never came. Separate modes for command & insert just feels inherently clumsy and slow to me. Is there some other killer feature that can't or hasn't been reproduced by modern editors?
If you work a lot on the command line on UNIX and Linux systems, vi is the best choice for many because it is extremely widely available and it is also very powerful once you have mastered it.
Re: Show HN: I built an online interactive course that helps you learn Vim faster
#125If you want to internalize the vi cursor keys hjkl a good and fun way to do it is to play "hunt" (part of the "bsdgames" debian package, man page at https://manpages.debian.org/unstable/bsdgames/hunt.6.en.html ).
Hunt is a text based 2d multiplayer labyrinth deathmatch game. It even has a unique feature: Labyrinth walls that you can shoot and that will eventually regrow (sometimes different than before).
Re: Show HN: I built an online interactive course that helps you learn Vim faster
#126Can someone please explain to me why I should learn vim? I've made several attempts in my lifetime because I thought there would be some magical "ah-ha" moment, but it never came. Separate modes for command & insert just feels inherently clumsy and slow to me. Is there some other killer feature that can't or hasn't been reproduced by modern editors?
If you live and breath the command line it's a great skill to have because it's available everywhere and it's a very powerful editor. If you're not a heavy command line user, you are probably fine sticking with whatever you already know.
Re: Show HN: I built an online interactive course that helps you learn Vim faster
#127A tangential question, why is .so the new cool TLD to use for tech startups/projects?
I know the lack of availability of .com/other common TLDs is a problem. I understand the reasoning behind using .io to represent software/saas startups (stands for inputs/outputs). I don't understand .so though. From what I remember, Notion was probably the first high profile startup using it, and it just kinda took off. Searching "why .so domain" comes up with nothing except a Reddit thread with the Notion founder saying it was mostly because it was just an available TLD for "notion" at the time.
Re: Show HN: I built an online interactive course that helps you learn Vim faster
#128Can someone please explain to me why I should learn vim? I've made several attempts in my lifetime because I thought there would be some magical "ah-ha" moment, but it never came. Separate modes for command & insert just feels inherently clumsy and slow to me. Is there some other killer feature that can't or hasn't been reproduced by modern editors?
Higher precision in intent for many standard operations. These aren't perfectly Vim commands, but from the Vim-like 'evil mode' for emacs, I have some examples of common idioms I use frequently:
- 'I want to change the name of this variable. (Change Word)'
- 'I want to copy the contents of this braced block. (Yank Inside Matching-braces)'
- 'I want to surround this word in parentheses. (Visual-mode (region selection) Around Word Surround-with Matching-parens)'
You get used to the separate modes fairly quickly. Your existing editor already works that way when switching between 'region' and 'insert' modes; it's just the command mode that throws people off initially. It's not that rough, especially if you have a reasonably placed key to return to command mode.
Re: Show HN: I built an online interactive course that helps you learn Vim faster
#129Can someone please explain to me why I should learn vim? I've made several attempts in my lifetime because I thought there would be some magical "ah-ha" moment, but it never came. Separate modes for command & insert just feels inherently clumsy and slow to me. Is there some other killer feature that can't or hasn't been reproduced by modern editors?
If you work a lot on the command line on UNIX and Linux systems, vi is the best choice for many because it is extremely widely available and it is also very powerful once you have mastered it.
Sorry, but this is the same non-answer I have heard my entire life.
I do primarily work on the command line and I can assign $EDITOR to anything I want. So what makes it so much more powerful than the plethora of other editors in the space?
Re: Show HN: I built an online interactive course that helps you learn Vim faster
#130Well I think the nice point of doing excercise in a web browser is that you can quickly switch to another tab and search for daring questions such as " by the way why on earth does this monstrosity want me to use hjkl? That don't make any sense!!!!" https://catonmat.net/why-vim-uses-hjkl-as-arrow-keys For a mostly data/SQL guy wanting to learn more about coding it still don't make much sense but at least I know why a…
> " by the way why on earth does this monstrosity want me to use hjkl? That don't make any sense!!!!"
Indeed, why? Using hjkl is about the worst way to move around in vim...