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20 Years of Vim

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Re: 20 Years of Vim

#21

Post by mattl »

mekster wrote: post #17
mpereira wrote: post #2

I used data from the Vim git repository to create an annotated chart of some of the main moments in the last 20 years of Vim development. Vim was the first text editor I've ever used (back in 2008), and it shaped the way I interact with computers forever. I'm grateful to all maintainers, and to Bram for creating it and shepherding it through all these decades. The annotations are interactive, so if you hover them you…

> Vim was the first text editor I've ever used (back in 2008) How could anyone skip any other more "normal" editors and jump right into Vim?

Like what? ed?

Re: 20 Years of Vim

#22

Post by zabzonk »

for me, it is more like "40+ years of vi". vim is simply the best version of all of the vi-based editors that i have used, across many platforms. vim is brilliant (and i am very sad to hear of the author's death), but i think we really owe it all to bill joy.

Re: 20 Years of Vim

#23

Post by sodality2 »

bee_rider wrote: post #20
mekster wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Vim was the first text editor I've ever used (back in 2008) How could anyone skip any other more "normal" editors and jump right into Vim?

When do most people use text editors? I think wouldn’t be that surprised if somebody fist used a text editor when they first got into Linux or programming.

I’d imagine most people’s first impression would be Notepad on windows- I wouldn’t count Word or even WordPad.

Re: 20 Years of Vim

#24

Post by kingkongjaffa »

sodality2 wrote: post #23
bee_rider wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When do most people use text editors? I think wouldn’t be that surprised if somebody fist used a text editor when they first got into Linux or programming.

I’d imagine most people’s first impression would be Notepad on windows- I wouldn’t count Word or even WordPad.

It was definitely notepad to edit some obscure .ini files on some pc game, or reading a Readme on a cracked/pirated game. On windows that would be the obvious case.

Downloading something over limewire or torrent and seeing a readme file for the first time is a pretty strong memory.

My first IDE was visual studio writing Visual Basic, I quickly binned that for netbeans and Java and then I think ended up using Eclipse.

Today I’m a casual evil mode emacs user mostly for magit and org-mode. also working in VScode for web languages.

Re: 20 Years of Vim

#25

Post by cristoperb »

mattl wrote: post #21
mekster wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Vim was the first text editor I've ever used (back in 2008) How could anyone skip any other more "normal" editors and jump right into Vim?

Like what? ed?

I think they probably mean a non-modal visual/screen editor (like NotePad on Windows or TextEdit on Mac). I used pico on Unix before learning vi, for example, which is probably a common progression.

Re: 20 Years of Vim

#26

Post by pawelduda »

Icathian wrote: post #16
pawelduda wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After neovim was released, I could feel the pace pick up, subjectively

I wonder why that is. Just a bigger tent, with some of the benefits being committed back to vim? More pressure to bring in features from neovim pushing the pace faster? I'd be curious to hear an explanation if anyone has one.

IIRC there was pushback from vim devs to implement async, so neovim did it. Shortly after async also made it to vim

Re: 20 Years of Vim

#27

Post by JNRowe »

amelius wrote: post #19

Is anyone keeping track of what the most popular Vim commands are? Personally, I've been using Vim for years, but I must confess that I use almost the same commands as I did in the beginning. Is there any good website that teaches useful tricks, maybe on a daily basis?

I really can't recommend Drew Neil's resources enough. The vimcasts¹ series are great if you're the sort of person who likes videos to learn with, and both his books are excellent²³. [The books may appear to be getting a little long in the tooth, but their contents are still very applicable to today's usage.]

My own "trick" for improving my vim usage was to start mapping things to that have better replacements, it is a great way to shock yourself out of bad habits like hjkl movements or reliance on /. Then again, I think text-objects and the items below it in motion.txt are the main to use vim so YMMV.

¹ http://vimcasts.org/

² https://pragprog.com/titles/dnvim2/practical-vim-second-edit...

³ https://pragprog.com/titles/modvim/modern-vim/

Re: 20 Years of Vim

#29

Post by rangerelf »

mekster wrote: post #17
mpereira wrote: post #2

I used data from the Vim git repository to create an annotated chart of some of the main moments in the last 20 years of Vim development. Vim was the first text editor I've ever used (back in 2008), and it shaped the way I interact with computers forever. I'm grateful to all maintainers, and to Bram for creating it and shepherding it through all these decades. The annotations are interactive, so if you hover them you…

> Vim was the first text editor I've ever used (back in 2008) How could anyone skip any other more "normal" editors and jump right into Vim?

What was a "normal" editor in '08?

After trying out finger-twister with Emacs, vim was a breath of fresh air, and had better features than plain "vi", like it was improved or something.

Now, how do I save and exit?

Re: 20 Years of Vim

#30

Post by rangerelf »

xnx wrote: post #3

Cool tool! I had to double check because I thought Vim was much older. Indeed, Vim goes back to 1991 ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vim_(text_editor) ). This is a great view of the last 20 years of Vim.

Vim in '95 was a breath of fresh air: improved feature set over plain vi and still zippy.
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