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Looking for input regarding finding an IDE (spoilers: involves Emacs and Vim) (lemmy.ml)
submitted 11 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/9648279

I would like to premise this with the following:

  • The best approach is probably just testing out each and every editor that interests me until I've found what works best for me.
    • However, I wonder to what degree a test as such would be representative when the likes of Emacs and (Neo)Vim are considered; both of which are known for being a life time learning process.
  • I don't literally expect Emacs or (Neo)Vim to be drop-in replacements for any IDE. Some of the most basic IDE-functions are absent by default and some (perhaps more advanced) functionality might simply not be attainable at all.
  • I am not interested in anything that remotely resembles a flame war. The community at Lemmy has so far been very kind to me; let's keep it that way 😜.

Motivation

I've had experiences with Atom, VS Code and some of Jetbrains' IDEs like Pycharm and Rider. While I've been generally content with all of them, it leaves a bad taste in my mouth whenever I'm forced to switch IDEs because their lifetimes and/or lack of extensibility doesn't allow me to responsibly continue using them. As such, I'm interested in a long time investment that will grow as I will. Both Emacs and (Neo)Vim have passed the test of time and I honestly don't think they'll cease to exist in the upcoming decades, that's why I would love to start using either one of them.

Furthermore, Vi(m) keybindings seem to be somewhat ubiquitous and almost any IDE offers some support. As such, improving my Vi(m)-game should only net-positive my productivity (at least eventually). Also, fluency will benefit me whenever I'm remote accessing any random server as they will always have Vi(m) installed. Thankfully, this doesn't force me to use Vi(m) (or Neovim) just yet, because Emacs offers with Evil perhaps the single best Vi(m) implementation; outside of native Vi(m)*.

My setup:

  • I'm on a custom image of uBlue using their startingpoint as template. For those unaware; an oversimplification would be that it is Fedora Silverblue with some extras.
  • As such, I would like to have my developer environments local and have used Distrobox to that extent using steps similar to the ones outlined over here. But I'm not married to that specific way of utilizing local containers. So please feel free to recommend me something that's at least as good.
  • If I go for Emacs, then I will definitely rely on Evil.
  • If possible, I would like to use it for C#, Python and Rust. Furthermore, I engage in editing Bash scripts, Dockerfiles, Linux config files, texts written in Latex and/or Markdown and other files written in Nix or JSON. As both are very extensible, I don't expect any issues, but I might be wrong.

Questions:

  • First of all, does it make sense for me to only consider these two?
  • Can the split between Vim and Neovim be interpreted as the first schism and as such be a forebode for what's yet to come?
  • Google Trends suggests that Neo(Vim) is ever-popular. On the other hand; not only is Emacs relatively less popular, but its popularity seems to be slightly declining. Should this worry me regarding their long-time future? Especially considering that a thriving community is literally the lifeline for both of them.
  • For those that have used both extensively, which one do you prefer (if any) and why?
  • While I understand that the power of both of them lies primarily in how one can literally make them behave however suits their workflow best. Therefore, the use of premade configs and/or starter kits/distributions should (ideally) only be used either temporary or as a starting point. However, at this point, they provide a decent showcase of what each 'platform' has to offer. So:
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[–] [email protected] 16 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I have used vim/neovim for years and cannot go back to a non-modal editor. But TBH I got sick of its configuration. You need far too many plugins and config to get things into a sane working order to be usable on a day to day bases for any type of development. It takes ages to learn and become as productive as you were before and a lifetime to refine.

For the past year or so I have switched to helix and don't plan on going back to vim/neovim as my main editor ever again. It is a modal editor that is a mix between Neovim and Kakoune editors. It comes with batteries included, and supports an IDE like experience out the box with treesitter syntax highlighting and LSP language integrations out the box. My whole config is like 6 lines long yet it works far better then my old neovim setup with a multitude of plugins and hundreds of lines of config. It is like what AstroNvim, LazyVim, LunarVim and NvChad etc are trying to do to vim/neovim but instead has built in support for all the things they rely on plugins for. Which means there is no need to constantly keep them up to date nor weird edge cases where one plugin does quite integrate with another smoothly. It is all built in so things are designed to work well together.

But it currently does lack any plugin support. So if something is not built in that you want you have to make due without it (well, except language support, adding new LSPs is not too hard). And plugin support is being worked on so even this will be a non-issue hopefully in a year or two.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago (3 children)

I have used vim/neovim for years and cannot go back to a non-modal editor. But TBH I got sick of its configuration. You need far too many plugins and config to get things into a sane working order to be usable on a day to day bases for any type of development. It takes ages to learn and become as productive as you were before and a lifetime to refine.

Interesting. Though I can definitely see where you're coming from. Uhmm.., have you used any of the Neovim distributions to make maintenance easier?

For the past year or so I have switched to helix and don’t plan on going back to vim/neovim as my main editor ever again.

Both Helix and Lapce have certainly piqued my interest as FOSS alternatives to VS Code. However, both have issues related to how well their current Vi(m) implementation is. As you've touched upon it; Helix' keybindings and 'sentence-structures' are different to those found on Vi(m).

Furthermore, neither of the two have existed long enough to be able to profess any statement regarding their longevity. Like, there's no guarantee that I can keep using either of the two 20 years into the future. While no program is able to 100% guarantee that, undoubtedly, the track records for both Emacs and Vi(m) testify that -if anything- they would be the most likely ones to survive 20 years down the line; like how they've done for the last couple of decades.

I appreciate the input, but I simply don't want to invest in a program whose future is very unclear to me at this point in time.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

As you’ve touched upon it; Helix’ keybindings and ‘sentence-structures’ are different to those found on Vi(m).

Unless you really want vim bindings, try them out. At least Helix is based on the Kakoune editing model which is the editor I use, and I much prefer the way Kakoune works over vim, while still being close enough so that you can pick it up quickly if you already know vim and the other way around.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Unless you really want vim bindings

I kinda do for how ubiquitous Vim keybindings are.

try them out.

Regardless, I think I will try it out after I'm at least somewhat productive with Vim.

I much prefer the way Kakoune works over vim

I think preference is generally subjective. So you're completely in your right to prefer Kakoune over Vim (and vice versa). Though, if possible, would you mind elaborating what you prefer exactly and why?

while still being close enough so that you can pick it up quickly if you already know vim and the other way around.

Doesn't that disrupt muscle memory?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I kinda do for how ubiquitous Vim keybindings are.

Yeah, that’s a great reason to stick with it. It’s unfortunate that nothing really has Kakoune bindings other than Kakoune.

I think preference is generally subjective.

Of course, I know preference is subjective. That’s why I didn’t say “it’s better” :P Could very well be that vim works better for you.

The big reason I like them more is the concept of selections. Basically instead of a cursor you have a set of selections with start and end position (which could be the same position for a normal cursor), instead of having the object to delete as a parameter. For example, to delete two words it’s ‘d2w’ in vim, while it’s ’2wd’ in Kakoune. And after you type the ‘2w’, the selection shows what you’re about to delete, because it’s a separate command. It’s more useful when you’re operating on larger blocks of text, of course, or chain multiple commands together to create the selection you want. Sure, you can use visual mode in vim but it feels like an afterthought in a lot of ways.

I’ve already mentioned it but you can also have multiple selections at the same time, which I don’t think vim really does (I could be wrong though). This makes bulk operations really easy since they work exactly the same as operations on a single selection. For example, if you want to prepend let’s say “foo” to the next 10 lines, in Kakoune it would be ‘9CIfoo’ where C creates a selection one line under the current one, and I works the same as in vim. I believe you’d have to use macros for that in vim, something like ‘qqIfoojq9@q’.

Those two are I think the main reasons I like Kakoune.

Doesn’t that disrupt muscle memory?

I haven’t really had problems with it, at least. Maybe because I’ve used vim for a long time before Kakoune. TBH I also don’t really use vim a lot anymore except on one remote machine that isn’t mine.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

It’s unfortunate that nothing really has Kakoune bindings other than Kakoune.

That's indeed very unfortunate...

And after you type the ‘2w’, the selection shows what you’re about to delete, because it’s a separate command.

That genuinely seems like very useful functionality. Thanks for pointing that out!

Sure, you can use visual mode in vim but it feels like an afterthought in a lot of ways.

Could you perhaps give some examples so that I can better understand/grasp why you feel that's the case?

Those two are I think the main reasons I like Kakoune.

I haven’t really had problems with it, at least. Maybe because I’ve used vim for a long time before Kakoune. TBH I also don’t really use vim a lot anymore except on one remote machine that isn’t mine.

I am very grateful to you for sharing your experiences as a long time Vim user that currently prefers Kakoune over it. It has definitely impressed me and made me a lot more curious towards it. And I genuinely feel like I should think this over properly before I rashly commit to Vi(m). Thank you for raising such awareness!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Could you perhaps give some examples so that I can better understand/grasp why you feel that’s the case?

Hmm, one I guess is that it is not "permanent" and deactivates after one command (in Kakoune, you have to explicitly do ';' to collapse the selection to its end (which you can flip with the start using 'alt+;') or move around without extending the selection). That's really the only thing I can think of at the moment and I feel like often it really doesn't matter tbh, so maybe I was just talking out of my ass there a bit lmao.

Apparently you can quickly reselect it in vim with 'gv' though, which I never checked until now. That's useful to know.

One thing I'm really missing from vim though is that it can list directories, has a hex editor, and can read a bunch of other file formats. I think it can even edit remote files over sftp, but maybe I'm confusing that with Emacs. Kakoune just does local text files (though you can of course do stuff like '%|xxd' to pipe the file through xxd to get a hex view, edit and then '%|xxd -r' and save but that feels very very sketchy).

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

Hmm, one I guess is that it is not “permanent” and deactivates after one command (in Kakoune, you have to explicitly do ‘;’ to collapse the selection to its end (which you can flip with the start using ‘alt+;’) or move around without extending the selection). That’s really the only thing I can think of at the moment and I feel like often it really doesn’t matter tbh, so maybe I was just talking out of my ass there a bit lmao.

Regardless; thank you for mentioning this!

Apparently you can quickly reselect it in vim with ‘gv’ though, which I never checked until now. That’s useful to know.

Hehe, thanks for sharing that; might become useful soon 😅.

One thing I’m really missing from vim though is that it can list directories, has a hex editor, and can read a bunch of other file formats. I think it can even edit remote files over sftp, but maybe I’m confusing that with Emacs. Kakoune just does local text files (though you can of course do stuff like ‘%|xxd’ to pipe the file through xxd to get a hex view, edit and then ‘%|xxd -r’ and save but that feels very very sketchy).

Until yesterday I knew almost nothing about Kakoune. But I've since tried to do some reading; while there's still a lot to uncover and/or explore, I feel as if it tries to offer a more focused experience (for better or worse).

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago (8 children)

Interesting. Though I can definitely see where you’re coming from. Uhmm…, have you used any of the Neovim distributions to make maintenance easier?

I have, but dont like them. They all have weird install processes and need to manage their own set of configs on top of vim in your home dir. This makes them very hard to properly package or integrate with config management tools and require a different flow to keep them up to date from the rest of your system. They combine sometimes hundreds of plugins, of which only a few are designed to work together and while a lot don't try to step on each others toes that many I often find issues in niche use cases. And when you do find an issue, or something you want to tweak you have 100s of plugin configurations that you need to learn about to figure out just what is doing what and which options you need to tweak.

It is all just far more hassle then I want out of my editor these days. Helix just works out the box and has basically everything I want from a editor nicely integrated into it.

As you’ve touched upon it; Helix’ keybindings and ‘sentence-structures’ are different to those found on Vi(m).

They are a little different and take a bit to get used to. But IMO I find them far nicer way to work. It is very nice being able to see what your action is going to effect before you do it - unlike in vim when you just hope you have hit the right movement keys. And it also pops up a small window for leader keys (like space) which show you what you can do with it making it far more discoverable then vim/neovim without needing to pour though hundreds of pages of manuals to even get a glimpse of what it can do or needing to go back to them to remember something that you dont use very often. It is not trying to be a 100% vim compatible layer, it is trying to give you the best experience it can out the box. And I think it does that quite well (at least once you get used to the new way of working - which does not take that long).

Furthermore, neither of the two have existed long enough to be able to profess any statement regarding their longevity. Like, there’s no guarantee that I can keep using either of the two 20 years into the future.

20 years is a long time. I can see it existing for the next 5 years at least, and looks to be on the trajectory to be a long lasting product. Though no one can say for sure. But, the more people using it the more likely it is to stick around for the long term. Just about everyone that I have seen use it over vim have highly praised it and it has quite a few contributors already (700+ on github), which is very impressive compared to vim (about 300), and neovim (more then 1100).

And keep in mind that vim has been around so long thanks to a single maintainer, Bram Moolenaar, who passed away this year. Which is not a great sign for vims future for the next 20 years.

I appreciate the input, but I simply don’t want to invest in a program whose future is very unclear to me at this point in time.

The investment in helix is far less then that you need to put into vim/neovim due to all the configuration you need for them. Well worth it for how active it currently is and how many people are putting effort into it.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

I'm sorry, which editor allows you to exit easily with escape colon q bang enter?

Uh huh. That's what I thought.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (7 children)

Hi. I've briefly shared my experience with neo(vim) and emacs here. Going into all the details would require writing an encyclopedia because they're both so vast topics. I think the main factor of choice would be to know if you prefer to build your own perfect tool with just what you need and expand as you go (i.e. neovim) or just have a do-it-all ready tool right out of the box (i.e. emacs). Both will require some coding and maintenance anyway. In that regards, I personaly found neovim to be easier and more reliable but mileage may vary based on your needs and preferences. After years using vim 20 years ago, I made a break. Then I used emacs for a year before eventually going back to neovim. I would certainly recommend it vs vim and I would suggest starting from scratch (no lazyvim or similar) so you clearly understand how things work. This will certainly be useful in the long run anyway and that'll eventually save you time. Note that I've also tried welcome screens (startup) but really couldn't justify its use so I removed it after few months.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago (3 children)

I'm actually using nvim for rust development and it's really fucking great but I've been using vi for like 25 years so for me the only issue was configuration, the editor is just natural for me. If you also have to learn the editor I don't know what your experience will be.

As for configuring it for development I started with spacevim and managed with half the functionality normal IDE provides for quite some time. The experience was still good. About 6 months ago I set up nvim and now I have everything I need. I think setting up nvim for rust was as complicated as setting up spacevim. Spacevim provides way more out of the box but changing configuration is not easy at all.

I don't worry about vim/nvim "schism". The support is still great.

I would say just go with nvim, spend a week to set it up and don't get too obsessive if small things don't work. Enjoy the amazing responsiveness and great editor and you will figure out everything eventually. And if you have any questions just ask. I can share my config.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Nvim is more optimised, while emacs is more extensible. Basically you can modify core parts of emacs while it runs. I tend to use both, depending on the situation, with a lighter nvim config. Sometimes the 3 second emacs startup time is annoying so I use vim then. I think its fine to try both.

Regarding emacs declining popularity, I think that in the long term it could be a problem, since most people don't want to learn elisp just to configure their editor. Elisp is very powerful in emacs, but its design is very different to other languages, so as emacs contributors get older, it could possibly lead to less and less new contributors.

Idk about the vim distros, but I think Doom Emacs is easier for beginners to get into.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I tend to use both, depending on the situation, with a lighter nvim config. Sometimes the 3 second emacs startup time is annoying so I use vim then. I think its fine to try both.

Could you elaborate more upon your workflow? Like, in which situation do you prefer Emacs and when do you prefer Neovim? I get that the lighter option is preferred when you want to perform a quick edit or can't be bothered with startup time. But I want to know it beyond that and -if possible- what led you to favor one over the other in each situation.

Regarding emacs declining popularity, I think that in the long term it could be a problem, since most people don’t want to learn elisp just to configure their editor. Elisp is very powerful in emacs, but its design is very different to other languages, so as emacs contributors get older, it could possibly lead to less and less new contributors.

How do you envision Emacs' future? Would, at some moment in the future, some kind of compatibility layer of sorts be developed that lower the entrance barrier? To my knowledge, Emacs has -contrary to Vim- been more open to community development. So I don't expect something like NeoVim to be developed for Emacs as there's less need for it. But I don't know how much they'd be willing to change Emacs for the sake of making it more attractive for new users.

Idk about the vim distros, but I think Doom Emacs is easier for beginners to get into.

Compared to Spacemacs I assume*. If so, would you mind elaborating?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I'm not using lsp in Neovim so if I need lsp I'll just pull out emacs. If I'm already in the terminal I'll usually pull out Neovim to edit a file, but if I'm writing like markdown or something that uses images I like the ability to display images inline in emacs. LaTeX is always something I do in emacs because there's a built in pdf viewer in emacs and there's built in spell check also. In the terminal in emacs, sometimes I open up Neovim to do a quick edit because of muscle memory from the terminal. One thing that's really cool about Neovim is that you can embed it in other applications, so if I really have to use an ide that's not emacs, I'll just do that.

I don't use Neovim for complex tasks, because personally I find it a bit hard to discover commands compared to emacs. The menubar in emacs is really useful for finding useful commands in different major and minor modes.

Yeah there's a thing called EAF, which allows python and javascript to be embedded in emacs. It allows for more complex applications to be built in emacs, similar to VSCode. I'm not sure how difficult it is to make something with EAF, but I haven't really seen any things written in it that aren't in the EAF organization. I think the future could be EAF or maybe something like EAF to be able to leverage the power of the javascript ecosystem like how VSCode does for a lot of plugins. There have been some attempts to rewrite emacs in different languages, but emacs is too large, and you would lose the old ecosystem by doing that.

There's a larger community around Doom Emacs, and Doom Emacs looks nicer. Honestly though it doesn't matter that much which one you use since they are both pretty good.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

I’m not using lsp in Neovim so if I need lsp I’ll just pull out emacs. If I’m already in the terminal I’ll usually pull out Neovim to edit a file, but if I’m writing like markdown or something that uses images I like the ability to display images inline in emacs. LaTeX is always something I do in emacs because there’s a built in pdf viewer in emacs and there’s built in spell check also. In the terminal in emacs, sometimes I open up Neovim to do a quick edit because of muscle memory from the terminal. One thing that’s really cool about Neovim is that you can embed it in other applications, so if I really have to use an ide that’s not emacs, I’ll just do that.

Wow, the insights! *Vehemently noting these down somewhere* Heck, I think you've cracked the code. Since I've created these posts, I became more and more aware of how great both Emacs and (Neo)Vim are. And while I was already flirting with the idea to perhaps use both, I think you've just completely obliterated any other option; which is a good thing. As such, I'm actually grasping for words that would somehow be able to properly convey the feelings of gratitude I currently experience. For whatever it's worth; thank you from the bottom of my heart!

Yeah there’s a thing called EAF, which allows python and javascript to be embedded in emacs. It allows for more complex applications to be built in emacs, similar to VSCode. I’m not sure how difficult it is to make something with EAF, but I haven’t really seen any things written in it that aren’t in the EAF organization. I think the future could be EAF or maybe something like EAF to be able to leverage the power of the javascript ecosystem like how VSCode does for a lot of plugins. There have been some attempts to rewrite emacs in different languages, but emacs is too large, and you would lose the old ecosystem by doing that.

Once more; much appreciated!

There’s a larger community around Doom Emacs, and Doom Emacs looks nicer. Honestly though it doesn’t matter that much which one you use since they are both pretty good.

Yet again; I'm grateful! Have a good one! I wish you and your loved ones the best!

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I tried several editors but always come back to emacs. When I used LaTeX because of AucTeX, then I discovered org-mode and now I do my writing with org-mode and ConTeXt.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (2 children)

For years I used vanilla vim before finally switching to spacemacs like 4 years ago. I've never used neovim, because it just didn't seem stable and mature enough before I switched to spacemacs and at this point I'm happy with spacemacs and will probably stick with it for the foreseeable future.

My issue with vim, and the reason I switched, is that vimscript was an absolute nightmare. I was doing easy stuff, writing LaTeX, but getting vim to compile LaTeX and talk to my pdf reader (as you need if you're going to be working with LaTeX in any kind of serious way) took way too much configuration and my setup would break fairly often as well. Spacemacs is significantly easier. I was shocked when I went from "I've never used spacemacs before" to "I'm comfortably writing LaTeX here" in about half an hour. My setup still breaks occasionally and sometimes it's a bit difficult to figure out why and how to fix it, but it's much easier than vim was, that's for sure.

I also just like the emacs workflow. I like helm, I like being able to change how the editor works on the fly just by writing some elisp anywhere, I like how easy it is to access the documentation on functions, variables, keybindings, whatever else you might need. I like org-mode. I like that emacs has been around for decades and will be around for decades more.

I'd never heard of doomemacs. I'm pretty happy with spacemacs so I probably won't switch, but I'll at least read about it some more.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

Ironic that your main complaint about vim would have been solved by switching to Neovim -- the weaknesses of vimscript are one of the main reasons Neovim was created, I believe, and it supports Lua as an alternate config language.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

I was shocked when I went from “I’ve never used spacemacs before” to “I’m comfortably writing LaTeX here” in about half an hour.

This line really piqued my interest, especially considering that I've had another conversation with someone else in which the general sentiment seemed to be that "Spacemacs expects you to know Emacs, while being a completely different beast of itself.". May I ask how your Spacemacs is configured? Would you say it's close to the default config? Or rather a significant departure? Furthermore, I believe I've read the existence of some kind of version control. Which, at least by the name of it, should somehow contribute to a more stable experience. Or am I perhaps confusing things?

My setup still breaks occasionally and sometimes it’s a bit difficult to figure out why and how to fix it

Does this happen randomly? Or rather as a 'response'?

I like being able to change how the editor works on the fly just by writing some elisp anywhere

This sounds very interesting and promising. Would you mind providing an example of sorts such that I can perhaps better grasp both the sheer amount of new possibilities it provides as well as its (possible) limitations (if at all)?

I like that emacs has been around for decades and will be around for decades more.

I wholeheartedly agree! But, I am at least somewhat concerned when it comes to its 'gravitational pull from afar'. To me at least, it seems as if, currently, Neovim does a better job at attracting new people. Perhaps these are just mostly refugees from Vim. Nonetheless, it can't be ignored (I think). Would you mind sharing your thoughts on this?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Disclaimer: Never really used Emacs, but mediocre VI(M) user for nearly 25 years.

I am fully capable of using VIM for developing bigger programs, but I gave up on the wish of setting up VIM as an IDE. Still, IMHO VIM is worth knowing for quick edits, writing and remote work.

Seriously, if you want an IDE for Python and C#, VS Code with the Microsoft plugins is and will be miles ahead of the VIM experience. The Rust plugin for VS Code is IMHO subpar, the last time I tried it. I don't know what is the favorite IDE of Rust developers.

I wouldn't want to stop you trying out editors and having a nice journey, but in the last years, VS Code 'won' and is used by nearly every developer for a reason: It has not a perfect setup and a lot of annoying issues, but out of the box the experience is good enough(TM) and is has the biggest user base by far, so show stoppers will be fixed quite fast.

So, my advice would be: Learn vi, because it is a handy tool for quick edits with good defaults (looking at EMACS) and chose a popular editor or IDE for your development needs. The time trying to force VIM/EMACS into a descent IDE will never come back and the theory sounds better than it will be in reality.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Do you have any experience with neovim? I'm certainly not a Python programmer but I'm doing simple things for fun and so far neovim served me very well. If I eventually go deeper in Python I would be interested to know the limitations of neovim beforehand.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

No, never touched neovim.

The things you get 'for free' with VS Code:

  • Integrated debugger
  • Integrated unit test runner
  • black
  • isort
  • linting

For Python, AFAIK Microsoft have their own implementation of a language server, so I don't know how it compares to the Open Source options. My VIM config for Python runs black/isort on save and that's good enough for me.

IMHO the distance is far greater when you use a language like Java/C#, which has really descent support from IDEs.

If neovim serves your needs, enjoy using it and don't listen to random people in the internet. ;-)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

Thanks for the information. I'm always happy to hear from others because that's how I make progress. Also with my workflow in constant evolution it's good to know neovim's limitations so I can be prepared. Being curious by nature I will try other apps with no doubts anyway. I've tried vi, neovim, emacs, but only heard of VS so who knows...

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Seriously, if you want an IDE for Python and C#, VS Code with the Microsoft plugins is and will be miles ahead of the VIM experience.

Someone else already pointed how VS Code has become the most popular IDE (at least according to statistics found on stackoverflow). While categorically I'd like to dismiss VS Code for not adhering to F(L)OSS, VSCodium -however- actually does fit the bill. And while formerly I've had bad experiences on it related to how the plugin ecosystem is configured by default compared to VS Code, I've since learned how it works on VSCodium. So I shall set it up in case Emacs and/or (Neo)Vim somehow seem to be less fit for the job and/or I can't be bothered at that moment to configure Emacs/(Neo)Vim to do my bidding.

Learn vi

Will do.

The time trying to force VIM/EMACS into a descent IDE will never come back and the theory sounds better than it will be in reality.

I understand the concerns. And I agree that I should be realistic in how I approach this. Nonetheless, I'm faithful for it to be a very productive endeavor. Thank you for chiming in!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

My pleasure. :-)

My impression about VS Code being popular is also from workplaces at several companies, VS Code was literally on every machine and VS Code project config files are nowadays checked in with project into version control. (In the past I would not have been happy about config files in version control, but I just accepted it by now.)

One more question: How to setup VIM/NEOVIM or EMACS as a descent C# IDE? AFAIK the language servers support navigation and auto completion, what about refactoring, code generation, support for build systems, hot reloading for code while debugging etc.?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

My impression about VS Code being popular is also from workplaces at several companies, VS Code was literally on every machine and VS Code project config files are nowadays checked in with project into version control. (In the past I would not have been happy about config files in version control, but I just accepted it by now.)

That's actually kinda concerning 😅. I hope I can remain free to use whichever IDE suits me best. But thanks for pointing that out as it's a very realistic scenario.

How to setup VIM/NEOVIM or EMACS as a descent C# IDE?

Hehe, the crux. Honestly, I'm not very optimistic that it can do everything one might be used to do on something like Jetbrains' Rider. Nonetheless, I'll try to get it as close as I can and see from there if I'm willing to deal with it. I'm not entirely opposed to rely on other IDEs from time to time for specific functionality I'd be missing otherwise.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago (6 children)

As a long-time Vi user I would highly recommend giving it a shot for a solid month to see if it clicks for you. It's genuinely an excellent way to edit text beyond "just typing words" - it's a huge productivity boost once you're competent with even some of the basic commands. There are just soo many combineable short-cuts at your fingertips that once you get a few of them under your belt you'll go nuts without them. And the simple macros you can write can allow you to do mass manipulation of multiple lines in ways that are just so simple (e.g. "add quotes around every line and a comma at the end").

Dive in beyond the basic "hjkl:q" though.

Which version of vi you use won't largely matter. As a bonus most IDEs support a good subset of vi commands so your skills become transferable. I use PyCharm and other Jet Brains IDEs all the time and ideavim is "good enough" for what I do.

Emacs is dead near as I can tell.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

Dive in beyond the basic "hjkl:q" though.

This is a video I can't recommend enough: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d8XtNXutVto It's long (>1h) but it's very well made.

It's a long tutor go through with some bonus advanced tweak, and the explanations clearly helps remembering everything easily. If I knew it when I've started that would have saved me so much time and helped me from getting into bad habits I then had to fight against.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago (7 children)

I use Emacs + spacemacs in VI mode as a base for all my text editing on both Linux and windows (which is unfortunately required for work on occasion) machines.

For dev environments I mostly use nix + direnv + direnv-mode.

For C# I use the above plus omnisharp-roslyn + lsp-mode.

I tinker in all sorts of languages, and they all have at least basic support in the Emacs ecosystem. The popular ones should have fully functional language servers and debugger adapters.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago (5 children)

I'm a bit surprised that no-one mentioned ALE. If you want to turn vim into an IDE it goes a long way.

Having the compiler warnings/errors inside the buffer is already really useful, but then you can also add LSPs and there isn't really much missing. I've recently developed a Java program entirely in vim using Eclipse's LSP.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Vi (and other mode-switch vietnam-era editors with cult like followings of which there are none) really impaired my first few weeks of comp sci until a t-a showed me there are options. Modal editors were neat when required, but then we got full keyboards and control keys.

Man, does vi suck, but its thuggy PR volunteers do a good job of keeping people from assessing alternatives.

I'm glad there were options.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 11 months ago

Modal editors were neat when required, but then we got full keyboards and control keys.

Have you ever seen old Unix keyboards?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

How long did you try using Vi (or any other "mode-switch vietnam-era editors with cult like followings")? Have you experimented with any starter kit/distribution/config (or whatever) to ease you in? What do you use now?

Btw, I agree that stand-alone Vi probably is too far of a departure from modern IDEs. As far as I know, it's not even possible to give it IDE-like functionality apart from a few basic ones. Both Vim and especially Neovim do a better job at bridging the distance. FWIW, Vim only exists like for three decades now, while Neovim's first release happened in 2014; almost 10 years ago.

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