Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Learn Vim motions with an ice-cream van

thisismodest.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 53 posts

Re: Learn Vim motions with an ice-cream van

#11

Post by jldugger »

eska wrote: post #9
JdeBP wrote: post #4

Yes, hjkl navigation is certainly one of the things that should learn about a vi clone. But are novices well served, in the 2020s, by that being the primary thing that they learn before anything else? This is not a criticism of this WWW site specifically. The VIM doco has the same priorities, teaching hjkl navigation before arrow keys. (So do nvi2 and NeoVIM.) The problem is that the received wisdom, that arrow keys…

Sorry to be blunt, but if you don’t want to spend effort on touch typing (and therefore avoid arrow keys), learning vim motions is rather pointless and you might as well not bother.

but what if i learned to type Colemak?

Re: Learn Vim motions with an ice-cream van

#12

Post by eska »

jldugger wrote: post #11
eska wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry to be blunt, but if you don’t want to spend effort on touch typing (and therefore avoid arrow keys), learning vim motions is rather pointless and you might as well not bother.

but what if i learned to type Colemak?

At that point does your keyboard even still have arrow keys?

Re: Learn Vim motions with an ice-cream van

#13

Post by adrian_b »

jldugger wrote: post #11
eska wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry to be blunt, but if you don’t want to spend effort on touch typing (and therefore avoid arrow keys), learning vim motions is rather pointless and you might as well not bother.

but what if i learned to type Colemak?

Many years ago, I have switched to touch-typing using the Dvorak layout (on standard QWERTY keyboards), which I find much more comfortable.

Obviously any classic control key assignments, like those of vi or those of emacs, are far from optimal on a non-standard keyboard layout.

The only decent solution is to remap all control keys in your text editor, to whichever positions you prefer.

Any good text editor allows that. Likewise, all programs with a good user interface allow the remapping of the keyboard shortcuts.

Re: Learn Vim motions with an ice-cream van

#14

Post by alexhans »

tokamak-teapot wrote: post #8
JdeBP wrote: post #4

Yes, hjkl navigation is certainly one of the things that should learn about a vi clone. But are novices well served, in the 2020s, by that being the primary thing that they learn before anything else? This is not a criticism of this WWW site specifically. The VIM doco has the same priorities, teaching hjkl navigation before arrow keys. (So do nvi2 and NeoVIM.) The problem is that the received wisdom, that arrow keys…

The reasons I still use vi-style editing in editors are: 1. Efficiency, so I can be fast 2. Minimal stretching and whole-hand movement, so I don't get painful wrists and so I can be accurate. Using a keyboard's arrow keys doesn't fit with 2.

Touch typing essentially. It's such a comfortable way to work. Remapping mode switching to something like jk instead of Esc is vital to stay comfortably in the home row.

I always liked this site to grok some of those vim fundamentals [1] and the touch typing part was going to touch typing exercise webpages and getting pure practice.

- [1] http://learnvimscriptthehardway.stevelosh.com/

Re: Learn Vim motions with an ice-cream van

#18

Post by rpozarickij »

nehal3m wrote: post #6

Beautiful project. Vim controls really found their way into my muscle memory through Tridactyl and Vimium, browser extensions that let you drive web pages and the browser itself with Vim keybinds.

There's also Homerow [0] that adds Vimium-like features OS-wide on macOS. It does have some rough edges but overall I've been very happy with it. It usually works well even on apps that don't have proper keyboard navigation implemented and also handles situations with many clickable elements very well (e.g. IntelliJ).

[0] https://www.homerow.app/

Re: Learn Vim motions with an ice-cream van

#19

Post by throw-the-towel »

eska wrote: post #9
JdeBP wrote: post #4

Yes, hjkl navigation is certainly one of the things that should learn about a vi clone. But are novices well served, in the 2020s, by that being the primary thing that they learn before anything else? This is not a criticism of this WWW site specifically. The VIM doco has the same priorities, teaching hjkl navigation before arrow keys. (So do nvi2 and NeoVIM.) The problem is that the received wisdom, that arrow keys…

Sorry to be blunt, but if you don’t want to spend effort on touch typing (and therefore avoid arrow keys), learning vim motions is rather pointless and you might as well not bother.

I'll be blunt to you back: that's not true. Vim motions are useful because you don't have to switch between the keyboard and the mouse, even if you (like me) never bothered with touch typing.

Re: Learn Vim motions with an ice-cream van

#20

Post by flexagoon »

jldugger wrote: post #11
eska wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry to be blunt, but if you don’t want to spend effort on touch typing (and therefore avoid arrow keys), learning vim motions is rather pointless and you might as well not bother.

but what if i learned to type Colemak?

I just have a layer on my keyboard that puts arrow keys where hjkl are on qwerty when I hold the tab key. Since tab is right next to my pinky finger on my laptop, it easily became muscle memory, and allows to use home row navigation in all apps, not just the ones that support hjkl.
Post reply on HN