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Modeless Vim

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Re: Modeless Vim

#271

Post by sodapopcan »

joenot443 wrote: post #262
cassepipe wrote: post #239

My usual comment on any thread touching vim, as an answer to all hypothetical comments talking about how vim never clicked : Remap the Escape key to CapsLock else you will never like vim (provided you are a normal person) It's the most important key and you should punctuate all your inserts with it. So it'd better not be the key that's the furthest away from your fingers. The reason that's the case is an historical a…

> Remap the Escape key to CapsLock else you will never like vim (provided you are a normal person) I think this is great advice for EVERYONE, vim user or not. Someone else made this suggestion on HN some 8 years ago and I haven't looked back since. CapsLock is essentially useless for modern computing needs, but having a No/Cancel/Quit/Esc button immediately under your left pinky is fantastic. Your brain will get used…

Best use for capslock in my book is tap for escape, hold for ctrl.

Re: Modeless Vim

#272

Post by e12e »

cassepipe wrote: post #239

My usual comment on any thread touching vim, as an answer to all hypothetical comments talking about how vim never clicked : Remap the Escape key to CapsLock else you will never like vim (provided you are a normal person) It's the most important key and you should punctuate all your inserts with it. So it'd better not be the key that's the furthest away from your fingers. The reason that's the case is an historical a…

But caps lock is remapped to control already! :)

Re: Modeless Vim

#273

Post by broscillator »

benrutter wrote: post #166
Lio wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah but it’s a small island. If you learn Vim you’ll have access to Vi and Vi-like interfaces in lots of other software including terminals, database clients and everything that uses readline.

Curious what kind of interfaces you're thinking about? (Aside from vi, vim, nvim) From my experience anything with "vi navigation" basically just means using the home row keys for navigation + modes. So I haven't come across many interfaces yet where the verb order differences between helix/vim come into play.

In vimium I use vim navigation for scrolling around, / for search, and a bunch of tab actions that aren't vim accurate but vim inspired.

In mpv I use gg/G to getting to the beginning/end of a file.

Many terminal file managers use vim binds or idioms (such as x for delete, marks, etc).

Re: Modeless Vim

#274

Post by berkes »

jerpint wrote: post #200
jjcm wrote: post #37

Conceptually the reasons the author give for this (syntax highlighting and other features of vim outclass other terminal-based editors) make total sense. That said there's something absolutely defiling about this. It's like installing a V8 in a Tesla, or replacing the pumpkin in pumpkin pie. I love that it will make VIM more accessible for more people, but I hate how they do it. Kudos to the author.

It’s similar to preferring guitar hero because a real guitar has too many frets and too many chords to learn

I guess it's the end-goal then, though. If your goal is to become a rockstar and play the guitar in a band, GH is probably a very bad route to it. But if it is to "have fun" its perfect.

Same with this vim: if you just need an editor that is recognisable and "not weird" then this modeless vim might be useful; though why not just install nano, pico, gedit, notepad++ or even notepad.exe?

Re: Modeless Vim

#275

Post by broscillator »

AnonymousPlanet wrote: post #220
anticodon wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Power of Vi is that its keybindings are way more ergonomical compared to IBM CUA. If you're a touch typist. It doesn't make sense to change Vi/Vim/NeoVim keybindings because they're so convenient, composable and easy to remember.

That is only the case if you think you have to press Ctrl using your pinky. You can use the side if your palm instead. Then CUA suddenly becomes very ergonomic. Try it. I've done this for over 15 years now across a plethora of different keyboards and also survived several years of Emacs unharmed thanks to it.

I just tried this on my laptop and it is the most uncomfortable thing I've done on a keyboard.

Re: Modeless Vim

#276

Post by lozf »

hmeh wrote: post #263
carb wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I use Ctrl far more often than Esc as I'm usually navigating code and reading it vs writing it, so Caps Lock -> Ctrl is more valuable. Additionally, I use Ctrl outside of vim very frequently as I keep my terminal key bindings native, which means all of the command line control patterns use Ctrl (jump to front, jump to back, cut (forwards/backwards), move by word, reverse search, etc etc) I'm still of the opinion…

Por que no los dos? I map caps lock to escape on tap, ctrl on hold.

… and set "Both Shift Keys" to toggle caps lock.

Re: Modeless Vim

#277

Post by tmtvl »

AnonymousPlanet wrote: post #220
anticodon wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Power of Vi is that its keybindings are way more ergonomical compared to IBM CUA. If you're a touch typist. It doesn't make sense to change Vi/Vim/NeoVim keybindings because they're so convenient, composable and easy to remember.

That is only the case if you think you have to press Ctrl using your pinky. You can use the side if your palm instead. Then CUA suddenly becomes very ergonomic. Try it. I've done this for over 15 years now across a plethora of different keyboards and also survived several years of Emacs unharmed thanks to it.

How do you do that without hitting Shift? It seems needlessly finicky compared to just properly holding the key down with my pinky. I'd say the best way to avoid RSI while using key combinations is to follow proper procedure and hit the opposite modifier, e.g. Left Control + S (Right Control for Qwerty typists).

Re: Modeless Vim

#278

Post by broscillator »

stevebmark wrote: post #113
colordrops wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not really the same thing though is it? Each of vim's modes are extremely complex with their own usage of the vim grammar. The "modal" behavior you describe is very simple.

They are the same thing of course, complexity is not relevant to the definition. The main difference is Vim's editing modes are imperative. You have to glue together small painful commands to do what you want. Modern editors are declarative - you say "I want to move this file" or "I want to rename this variable" or "I'll drag this split here" and they do the rest.

A GUI element is not a mode, categorically.

Re: Modeless Vim

#279

Post by SAI_Peregrinus »

MantisShrimp90 wrote: post #258

I think it's funny how much emotional energy gets invested into any (neo)vim posts. But the energy is mostly people that never learned vim and feel super insecure about it. I'm not going to make the same mistake of judging this. If you are someone who has always hated vim and never want to touch it, go for it, this might make your day easier on some machine if you can load this repo really quick (although as others h…

Agreed. I prefer vim as my $EDITOR, but I don't use it for programming. There I prefer JetBrains IDEs mostly. When I'm editing something in a POSIX terminal, vi is guaranteed to be available and is powerful. Knowing how to use vi is useful because it's required by POSIX and thus available on any system you SSH into. That means default settings & no plugins, and maybe not even vim.
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