I often get asked why I still use Sublime. So I wrote this article singing it's praises.
I never get asked. It’s obvious. Just open a 4Gb log file as a developer. All my developers have it.
VSCode is just as fast for opening 4 GB log files
I still like Sublime Text
71–80 of 620 posts
Re: I still like Sublime Text
#72Sublime is just great software. It does everything I could possibly ever want an editor to do, and it does it with half the memory usage of VS Code. I like VS Code well enough, but I can't abide resource waste like that, especially when it doesn't actually buy me anything. Honestly, I use Sublime because nothing else can compare. Everything else is slow, bloated, worse to use, or some combination of the above.
Have you tried Zed, and if so, what's your opinion?
Re: I still like Sublime Text
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
See the attached CLA [0] and Privacy Policy [1]. [0]: https://zed.dev/cla [1]: https://zed.dev/privacy-policy
And yet, ST is closed source. Still a wild comparison. This isn’t just license preference either. I would imagine the efforts of the sublime lsp people would be greatly eased if they had access to the source. But nah zed bad because cla.
No it's not. I mostly find closed source application with clear lines more trustworthy than openwashed software.
I'm a big Free Software supporter. For my personal projects, I only use (A)GPLv3 or later.
However, I have a problem with software which comes with "GPLv3 BUT..." licenses. We have seen how CLAs weaponized against their contributors with rugpull license changes.
Also, Zed was closed source at first. I had beta access to that thing. Then they pivoted to "Open source with closed source collaboration servers" thing, and they claimed rights on anything passing through their servers (collaboration / zed-ai).
When software stops being local-only, being Free Software loses half the meaning, because you can do all the nefarious things on the backend, without people seeing them. "We only send harmless usage data" you may say, but you don't say how you process and which other signals you mix into that data from other sources or data brokers. That's a problem.
Remember Go's opt-out telemetry debacle. The math was solid, it was anonymous, yes. However it was forced opt-out via an environment variable, so the burden was continuously on us, the users.
If the Go team didn't change it to opt-in, I was ready to drop Go as a programming language, like many individuals and companies. Now the telemetry is opt-in, and users have better control.
These things are nuanced. We should be diligent. For example, Eclipse (my favorite IDE for the last two decades) has CLA, but they never abused the power they have, plus that thing is Apache 2.0 licensed. However, Zed's actions, combined with their privacy policy, doesn't inspire confidence, so I don't use it, and share my view about Zed.
If you don't agree that's fine, but pointing fingers like that is not.
As I said, I have chosen BBEdit over sublime 15 years ago, and still use that, and if BBEdit can detect and run any supported LSP OOTB, like magic, Sublime can do the same technically. So they should barrage the bug tracker. It's on Sublime to make it better. It's closed source, so the developer has forced themselves to fix it by making it closed source.
Re: I still like Sublime Text
#74To echo many sentiments here: Sublime does all I want in a text editor and I use it a lot. When VSCode became all the rage, I tried it but became annoyed very quickly with the loading times and wasted resources, so I switched back to Sublime.
You should consider trying it again, it's pretty fast now.
Re: I still like Sublime Text
#75I'm always up for trying new or old text editors, but they must have certain features that work out of the box for me to even consider them. A few clicks are fine, but I don't want to edit configuration files. In 2025, remote development support is a must for me.
Sadly it seems that Sublime doesn't do that yet
Re: I still like Sublime Text
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
And the license is awfully expensive. I was going to the website to pay $50 for my 7 developers, but it turns out it’s $100. No way. Or $65 per year: https://www.sublimehq.com/store/text
Yes I liked sublime text, but 65$ per year you can get the jet brain ide you need and it already includes most things you need and depends not on plugins from third party.
I'm curious where you're seeing jet brains subscriptions for $65 per year? Only RustRover and WebStorm seem to be somewhat close, with the rest being significantly more expensive.
Re: I still like Sublime Text
#77I can totally understand that. Why only one? I still use BBEdit on my Mac for all kinds of text editing (search/replace across files is excellent in it), even though I mainly use VS Code as IDE and Emacs for orgmode and automation via Elisp.
Because it’s too complicated to learn many complicated tools well instead of tweaking Sublime to do the search and replace across files, even if it’s a bit worse. Also you’re not limited to Macs
Re: I still like Sublime Text
#78To echo many sentiments here: Sublime does all I want in a text editor and I use it a lot. When VSCode became all the rage, I tried it but became annoyed very quickly with the loading times and wasted resources, so I switched back to Sublime.
You should consider trying it again, it's pretty fast now.
I have, from time to time. It certainly has become faster but Sublime still seems to be more nimble to me. On the more emotional side, I've also grown used to Sublime and I - mostly - just like using tools made by smaller shops or individual developers more than what the big corporations produce.
Re: I still like Sublime Text
#79They need to enhance their plugin API asap, i remember wanting to make a small assistant panel, the only choice was to use a pseudo mini-HTML api, it's not good for anything dynamic.. a shame
I'd love an Immediate Mode API, give me full control, or give me access to your OpenGL context, i'll write my own UI
They also need to improve the layout system for their panels, Origami is good, but sometimes using your mouse is better
And i agree about getting stuff to Package Control, it's unnecessary painful
Other than that, it's the perfect editor, but that plugin API holds it back, lots of missed opportunity, specially with the advent of AI stuff
Re: I still like Sublime Text
#80There's dozens of us. Dozens! Seriously though, having a lightweight text editor like Sublime that I use is an interesting comparison when I see people immediately reach for tools like VS Code. Especially my juniors.
The thing about VS Code is not that it's bad, it's just, like everything and the kitchen sink? Sublime Text just feels like a really nice tool bench that your craft for yourself.
I'm really happy to hear there are others out there.
(And yes, I totally bought the license, but never enter it in)