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Visual Studio Code is designed to fracture

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Re: Visual Studio Code is designed to fracture

#61

Post by brundolf »

slimsag wrote: post #55
skybrian wrote: post #19

I remember when the FSF had dire warnings about using the Sun JDK. I ignored it and kept on using Java, and nothing bad happened. The JDK was eventually GPLed, and by then I decided I didn't like Java anymore and moved on to better languages anyway. I feel kind of the same about VS Code. Binary product? Telemetry? Centralized marketplace? Some plugins are closed source? Eh, whatever. That stuff doesn't get in my way…

I wonder did the drive behind people creating open source JDKs have nothing to do with Sun open sourcing theirs? I wonder in an alternative world where Sun locked down Java as hard as possible and sued anyone and everyone, would they not have been bought by Oracle? Are we sure that an editor will be able to displace VS Code in the future, if it's given away for free and so feature-packed? Browsers are another example…

But ultimately these applications are still winning based on merit. If somebody created a new editor or browser that was substantially better, nothing's really stopping everyone from moving to it.

Now- we can talk about how it's a problem that nobody can afford to build something good enough to compete with what these megacorps can afford to develop and give away for free. But that's a different, older, much bigger discussion.

Re: Visual Studio Code is designed to fracture

#63

Post by zozbot234 »

brundolf wrote: post #42

This is a good summary of the playing field, but I think they're way overblowing the panic In summary Microsoft has: - Made an incredibly good web-based code editor which is 100% OSS, no strings attached - Made an extensions repository and a bunch of really high quality first-party extensions that have restricted licenses Sure, in a perfect world the whole thing would be fully OSS. But in the worst-case, where people…

> but I think they're way overblowing the panic

I think some concern is warranted simply because few people are aware that the default VS Code distribution has spyware and proprietary addons in it, and you do need to use something else if you prefer a fully FLOSS ecosystem.

Re: Visual Studio Code is designed to fracture

#64

Post by ProAm »

skybrian wrote: post #19

I remember when the FSF had dire warnings about using the Sun JDK. I ignored it and kept on using Java, and nothing bad happened. The JDK was eventually GPLed, and by then I decided I didn't like Java anymore and moved on to better languages anyway. I feel kind of the same about VS Code. Binary product? Telemetry? Centralized marketplace? Some plugins are closed source? Eh, whatever. That stuff doesn't get in my way…

> The politics isn't as good as I'd like, but often the politics never actually materializes as a bad user experience, despite the complaints.

"The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. "

Re: Visual Studio Code is designed to fracture

#65

Post by noduerme »

cowtools wrote: post #32
noduerme wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One reason I chose VS is because I'm a small dev shop, often working alone, and it's one of the only good IDEs around with plugins for syncing via sftp. In many cases that saves me having to use a separate client or configure cloud rollouts for minor code changes. Small devs are the target audience for vscode and also the most likely to be negatively impacted if the environment fractures.

See, what I would do in my case is I would just make a bash script for sftp. I'm not even sure if small devs benefit from such a bloated editor: the time you have to invest in writing a script or learning a command-line tool is to some extent time invested in learning a fungible skill, whereas time you invest in learning a graphical tool is usually not as extensible or reliable. A major time-sink in a previous job si…

The upshot of such a graphical IDE for me is basically lots of panes and windows to rapidly search in. I might have one library I've branched 7 times for 12 projects and need to have a few open and jump quickly to which version some line of code is referencing. It also helps with keeping version control and history right next to the working files. A bash script would be fine for syncing but it's not going to give me a diff on each file before I upload to a production environment. Playing it that close requires tooling in some red and green to make sure you don't hit the wrong button.

Re: Visual Studio Code is designed to fracture

#66

Post by seabrookmx »

mikewarot wrote: post #23

.NET is 20 years old now, according to Wikipedia. I've never seen the point of it, and have avoided using it in anything I've cared about. If people are foolish enough to use it, I'm not going to be able to stop them. I've tried Visual Studio (to compile my forth project with), but it just doesn't work for me anyway. There's too big an impedance mismatch. I'll stick with NotePad++ for non-pascal stuff, and Lazarus fo…

What does .NET (and Visual Studio for that matter) have to do with Visual Studio Code? The latter is an IDE based on web technologies that shares naming with Visual Studio proper in the same way Java shares a name with JavaScript.

> I've never seen the point of it

Well if we're talking .NET, it's OSS now and runs on Mac/Linux/Docker. It's legitimately a great platform for writing backend services. C# is a java-like that has a lot of really nice benefits over java (in a similar vein to Kotlin). C# also pioneered the async/await syntax you see everywhere now, and as such has first class async and streaming support which is a real boon for workloads.

> Notepad++

A man of culture I see!

Re: Visual Studio Code is designed to fracture

#67

Post by hibbelig »

pxc wrote: post #39
memco wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does eMacs have a good remote editing and debugging system comparable to VSC? I’ve tried pycharm and nvim, but both were clunky and did not work as well if at all for remote debugging and editing with navigation, autocomplete, linting etc. VSC does all that with very little manual configuration required.

> Does eMacs have a good remote editing and debugging system comparable to VSC? Emacs has a remote editing system sort of similar to VSCode, but much older, less slick, and a bit quirkier. But imo it's quite good. It's called TRAMP mode: https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/TrampMode

I haven’t used the VSC remote thing. I believe it requires to install things on the remote computer, and if those are unavailable you’re out of luck. Tramp makes do with whatever is there.

Re: Visual Studio Code is designed to fracture

#68

Post by wudangmonk »

d0mine wrote: post #2

"The move affects millions of developers, as the Python extension is by far the most popular tool in the VS Code Marketplace" One of the reasons to use Emacs is to avoid asking Microsoft for permission to code.

I would only consider moving away from emacs for something faster and equally extensible. VSCode always felt slow to me and it seems like a really bad idea to even invest in extending it.

I did like the whole idea of LSP and have liked the changes that it has brought to emacs in unifying autocomplete and syntax highlighting even though it doesn't always work and can be rather slow. Too bad that it was Embrace Extend Extinguish all along.

Re: Visual Studio Code is designed to fracture

#69

Post by philonoist »

Even developers are taken for a ride. Just like WhatsApp and Chrome, it all comes down to ripple effects of "If others didn't use it, I can't". I have given a number of examples of this stubborn sticky monopoly below.

Every newbie while learning to code: scared of reviews on internet like "I couldn't get help with this editor online or with colleagues and I can't risk being stuck on this project so I switched to VS Code"

Every newbie while interviewing: impress interviewers even by a little chance that they use the "industry standard" tool to code.

Every experienced developer, even on this HN post, says "It doesn't have excellent support like VS CODE, in remote development, centralized marketplace, etc."

I have pieced together and my conclusion comes from the observation below. There is a reason enterprise, rather than startup world use M$ products. The power and money to fight for fairness.

Their C#/.NET compiler is open source and excellently designed but with a secret tunnel to nefarious practices to use when needed[ like closed source]

VSCODE is open source but with a secret tunnel to nefarious practices to use when needed[ like telemetry and extensions where the real power lies, being closed source]

Phone and App market but to with a secret tunnel to nefarious practices to use when needed[ it is going to be based on android like Edge on Chromium]

VStudio is best IDE but to with a secret tunnel to nefarious practices to use when needed[ like telemetry + closed source extensions + Heavy + slow + whatnot!]

MAUI is Wowza! tool with a secret tunnel to nefarious practices to use when needed[ like repackage old Xamarin in new branding]

OneNote is the best note taking app ever but with a secret tunnel to nefarious practices to use when needed[ like lock in using obscure format and closed source]

Every company they acquire but with a secret tunnel to nefarious practices to use when needed[ Embraaace Exteeend Extin...]

Re: Visual Studio Code is designed to fracture

#70

Post by [deleted] »

shbooms wrote: post #54

Holy hell, this blog is virtually unreadable. Article content aside, the fact that after pretty much every single paragraph there's 1-2 giant links to some other article and/or an ad is just infurianting and makes it impossible to focus. I stopped reading after the first few and will be adding this site to my blocklist.

[deleted]
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