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Vim Anti-Patterns That Cause Beginners To:Quit

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Re: Vim Anti-Patterns That Cause Beginners To:Quit

#51

Post by ironmagma »

KronisLV wrote: post #45
ironmagma wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of times it's easier to just learn the tools of the trade instead of fighting a never-ending battle. I don't need or like awk, but I learned it because it's in use and it was very helpful to do so.

This leads to being stuck with tools which are unpleasant to use and sometimes not suited for what you want to do with them - for example, editing text files as a beginner . Would it be better if Nginx would have never been written and we'd all use Apache instead? What about Docker never having been written and us having to ship VM images with no tool chain around them? What about JetBrains never creating new IDEs an…

Any sufficiently capable editors will be complex. Emacs for example is just as hard to learn if not harder than vim. Nano is easier for one simple reason which is that it is not as capable.

Could vim be easier? Probably. But it’s still useful and is an archetype. Remember I’m not saying new code should be written in Awk. It’s just useful to know how to use the tools that everyone knows, regardless of whether they should be replaced or improved.

The handsaw isn’t perfect or that beginner friendly, but if you refuse to learn to use one because there are other cutting instruments, you’ll probably have a bad time compared to if you didn’t.

Re: Vim Anti-Patterns That Cause Beginners To:Quit

#52

Post by daptaq »

KronisLV wrote: post #45
ironmagma wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of times it's easier to just learn the tools of the trade instead of fighting a never-ending battle. I don't need or like awk, but I learned it because it's in use and it was very helpful to do so.

This leads to being stuck with tools which are unpleasant to use and sometimes not suited for what you want to do with them - for example, editing text files as a beginner . Would it be better if Nginx would have never been written and we'd all use Apache instead? What about Docker never having been written and us having to ship VM images with no tool chain around them? What about JetBrains never creating new IDEs an…

Vi (rather than vim) should probably be treated more like how most developers know how to use a unix shell, rather than a specific product. Far more than the program that implements it, vi(m) is more relevant as a UI. Granted, it is not idea and goes contrary to the expectations of users who haven't had much experience with it yet, but it is at least for the time being a de-facto standard worth knowing the basics of (and I mean extrem basics, how to enter leave insert mode, how to save how to quit. If you aren't using a real vi, then anything about the normal mode is nice to know).

Re: Vim Anti-Patterns That Cause Beginners To:Quit

#53

Post by dustintrex »

KronisLV wrote: post #45
ironmagma wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of times it's easier to just learn the tools of the trade instead of fighting a never-ending battle. I don't need or like awk, but I learned it because it's in use and it was very helpful to do so.

This leads to being stuck with tools which are unpleasant to use and sometimes not suited for what you want to do with them - for example, editing text files as a beginner . Would it be better if Nginx would have never been written and we'd all use Apache instead? What about Docker never having been written and us having to ship VM images with no tool chain around them? What about JetBrains never creating new IDEs an…

As noted earlier in the thread, that embraced and transformed easier to use version of vim is called Sublime Text. (I actually thought it was a fork, but no, apparently it's just "inspired by".)

Vim's power comes from it being 1) text-based, 2) very fast to load and manipulate files, and 3) very fast to use if you are familiar with the syntax. Like many power tools, it's the last part here that's hard, but it's also very hard to fix without affecting one of the other two qualities. For example, Emacs nails points 1 & 3, but is so much slower to load that few people use it as their default $EDITOR, and has a sizable learning curve as well.

Re: Vim Anti-Patterns That Cause Beginners To:Quit

#55

Post by wruza »

vintermann wrote: post #49
drekipus wrote: post #17

There's been a number of "anti-vim, use a real ide(TM)" posts coming into my feed lately and I don't get why. Do people really get buttmad about this? I switched from vscode to vim as I found it to be largely much faster in getting around when I started my new job, some people find the opposite. A ok. Why do people try to force us into these largely closed solutions? ( Mainly it's vscode, which has a real EEE threat)

I've never gone for vi(m), even after roughly 25 years of using Linux now. I'm not trying to force you into anything, certainly not anything closed. I used NEdit until its lack of utf-8 and ancient GUI library started causing trouble. Then I used Slava Pestov's JEdit, which was wonderfully extensible and portable. Now I use vscode, which is just so outrageously well made that even electron and Microsoft can't scare m…

stick shift

That is an unfair comparison on the edge of a strawman. In vim, you see your mode right at the cursor shape (bar in insert, block in normal, selection in visual). It’s like saying that DEs are bad because switching active windows is modal. Why not send input to the first window in the taskbar by holding ctrl and to the second by holding ctrl-shift then? Does that sound absurd? Even when you make a modal mistake once in a while, no stakes are lost because uu.

One thing I agree on is that UI could use more graphics, smoothness and features. But all my attempts to adopt vscode failed miserably. It’s just too mouse-y and too configure-y but still lacks futuristic features I want.

Re: Vim Anti-Patterns That Cause Beginners To:Quit

#56

Post by KronisLV »

ironmagma wrote: post #51
KronisLV wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This leads to being stuck with tools which are unpleasant to use and sometimes not suited for what you want to do with them - for example, editing text files as a beginner . Would it be better if Nginx would have never been written and we'd all use Apache instead? What about Docker never having been written and us having to ship VM images with no tool chain around them? What about JetBrains never creating new IDEs an…

Any sufficiently capable editors will be complex. Emacs for example is just as hard to learn if not harder than vim. Nano is easier for one simple reason which is that it is not as capable. Could vim be easier? Probably. But it’s still useful and is an archetype. Remember I’m not saying new code should be written in Awk. It’s just useful to know how to use the tools that everyone knows, regardless of whether they sho…

> It’s just useful to know how to use the tools that everyone knows, regardless of whether they should be replaced or improved.

This is a perfectly reasonable argument to make and probably reflects the reality of working in the industry pretty well.

That said, I'm still stoked to see what people come up with in the next 20 years.

Maybe gradual improvements like Neovim tried to do. Or perhaps Vim-like text interaction in VSC or JetBrains IDEs, with all of their plugins and ecosystem. Or maybe something even more grand!

Re: Vim Anti-Patterns That Cause Beginners To:Quit

#57

Post by qolop »

vintermann wrote: post #49
drekipus wrote: post #17

There's been a number of "anti-vim, use a real ide(TM)" posts coming into my feed lately and I don't get why. Do people really get buttmad about this? I switched from vscode to vim as I found it to be largely much faster in getting around when I started my new job, some people find the opposite. A ok. Why do people try to force us into these largely closed solutions? ( Mainly it's vscode, which has a real EEE threat)

I've never gone for vi(m), even after roughly 25 years of using Linux now. I'm not trying to force you into anything, certainly not anything closed. I used NEdit until its lack of utf-8 and ancient GUI library started causing trouble. Then I used Slava Pestov's JEdit, which was wonderfully extensible and portable. Now I use vscode, which is just so outrageously well made that even electron and Microsoft can't scare m…

How can you tell modal editing is bad without having used it? You said you've never gone for vim in 25 years, how then can you know what model editing is like? Because you read some behavioral psychology textbook?

Your comment is by far the most ignorant one I've come across on hackernews.

Take my advise, go ahead and try out vim for a few weeks. Then even if your opinions don't change at least you'll have an ounce of credibility

Re: Vim Anti-Patterns That Cause Beginners To:Quit

#58

Post by ihateolives »

lawn wrote: post #15
civilized wrote: post #5

I just don't buy the premise that I will profit from spending a lot of time optimally customizing a text editor to my supposedly very unique and special needs. Seems more like a weird para-work hobby than an actual productivity hack.

I spend all days writing code in my editor, and will probably do so for many decades to come. Even small improvements will add up to to large differences over time.

My speed of writing code (or anything else really apart from commenting on random websites) is limited mainly to my thought process about the logic I'm about to write. If you can code so fast that fractions of a second make a difference then more power to you but most people probably can't.

Re: Vim Anti-Patterns That Cause Beginners To:Quit

#59

Post by nikau »

civilized wrote: post #5

I just don't buy the premise that I will profit from spending a lot of time optimally customizing a text editor to my supposedly very unique and special needs. Seems more like a weird para-work hobby than an actual productivity hack.

> I just don't buy the premise that I will profit from spending a lot of time optimally customizing a text editor to my supposedly very unique and special needs.

> Seems more like a weird para-work hobby than an actual productivity hack.

Because you will use the skills for forty years throughout your career?

Re: Vim Anti-Patterns That Cause Beginners To:Quit

#60

Post by pbalau »

dijit wrote: post #34
jiggawatts wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People say things like this, as if other text editors don't have the same functions. The alternative is not "notepad.exe", it's Textpad, VS Code, or IntelliJ IDEA. Delete an entire line: CTRL-Shift-K in VS Code. Or just look at the end of the file: Ctrl-End in most editors. Etc...

I can only speak to my experience, and I might be mistaken: but the reason I tend to reach for vim bindings is not because I already know them- it's because, mostly, it's consistent where as IDE key binds change depending on the platform and IDE. IntelliJ has programmable keys and they prompt you on first run which ones you'd like to use "Original?", "MacOS", "Linux". VSCode has it's own key binds for various movemen…

> VSCode has it's own key binds for various movements (like indenting a block)

Like tab or is something more elaborate?

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