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I don't use vim as my go to editor so I may be asking a silly question; does it just use idiotic defaults or something? I've only met a couple 'vim users' who c

I don't use vim as my go to editor so I may be asking a silly question; does it just use idiotic defaults or something? I've only met a couple 'vim users' who could just hop onto someone else's vim setup and be productive, and I've never met a single vim user who could use someone else's setup without making comments about everything being different. I guess the question is do people modify vim cause they can or cause they have to?

adbachman 11y ago
For me, it's because I can. When I find a job I do often, I add it to the config, when I find a tool that makes a job easier I pick it up. Bare, freshly installed vim is quite useable, but is missing the affordances of my personally customized environment. It's kind of like the difference between being able to cook and walking into a strange kitchen and immediately knowing where everything is. In my home I'm comfortable, I know that the vegetable peeler is in a different drawer than the steak knives. In a friend's home, I'm just going to have to ask where something is every few minutes if I want to get work done.
dchest 11y ago
Correct, the defaults are indeed idiotic, probably because they are from the last century. I even have a freaking plugin installed to properly close buffers (https://github.com/cespare/vim-sbd/ https://github.com/cespare/vim-sbd/). It's indeed harder to use vim without my customizations. I guess it's more like a "build-your-own-editor from parts" kind of thing.
sean-duffy 11y ago
On my home machine I have a vimrc of about 30 lines, but I could do without most of it, I could probably reduce it to about 5 lines if I had to. So whenever I use vim on a computer at university or on a new machine in the workplace, as long as it has syntax highlighting and auto indent on, which it usually does, that's fine for me.
JD557 11y ago
The default vim config is pretty barebones. Actually, one of the main goals of Neovim[1] is to provide better defaults[2], such has syntax highlighting. [1] https://neovim.io/ https://neovim.io/ [2] https://github.com/neovim/neovim/issues/276 https://github.com/neovim/neovim/issues/276
- oneJob 11y ago
  Holy ish! Neovim has progressed so much. Exciting.
  - JD557 11y ago
    I'm actually using it currently and I really enjoy the built-in terminal. It makes my workflow much better. Be aware that some plugins might have some bugs. I also got segfaults when using multiple terminals (although that's quite rare).
    - z1mm32m4n 11y ago
      Interesting. I tried out the built-in terminal and found that I couldn't navigate around panes as quickly as if I just used tmux instead. Are you using the default mappings, or have you made them easier to use somehow?
- aeosynth 11y ago
  The current defaults discussion is at https://github.com/neovim/neovim/issues/2676 https://github.com/neovim/neovim/issues/2676.
Widdershin 11y ago
Yes, the vim defaults suck. If you're building a new vimrc or want a common ground for pairing, I would recommend checking out [vim-sensible](https://github.com/tpope/vim-sensible https://github.com/tpope/vim-sensible) by tpope. It's a vim plugin that provides a set of sensible default options.
- FireBeyond 11y ago
  Vim Bootstrap (www.vim-bootstrap.com) is one I recently discovered and really like.
kosma 11y ago
Vim's default are indeed dumb, but what you described is not a vim-specific problem. Walk into any room full of coders and try to use their computers; you'll discover tons of weirdness that can't be explained by anything except by a desire to be treated like a princess.* Things like rebinding basic shortcuts, reversing the scroll direction (Mac users will get this), swapping Cmd/Ctrl, using some obscure shell or even infecting other people's machines with some haphazardly scp'd dotfiles. This kind of overcustomization is fine if you live in a basement and work on a project alone. As soon as you become a part of a team, please stop. You're making cooperation unnecessarily hard and spending company time on an optimization that isn't. *I sometimes joke that coders who refuse to conform to the industry standards should wear a tiara as an indication they are, indeed, unique snowflakes free from the usual social expectations. It seems to work.
- nothrabannosir 11y ago
  Wait, am I missing something obvious here, or are you seriously complaining about people reversing the scroll direction on their own computers?
  - 0942v8653 11y ago
    Apple reverses scrolling by default. I don't know about other coders' computers, but there are people who don't know how to change it, and whenever I boot into recovery mode it gets reversed.
    - bandrami 11y ago
      It's only "reversed" if you consider the other direction "normal". Either one makes sense: Mac acts like your finger is moving the page itself; X11 and Windows act like your finger is moving the location indicator on the scrollbar. Either one makes sense a priori, but once you're used to one the other becomes intolerable.
      - eru 11y ago
        Nah, I change back and forth between Mac and Linux. It's bearable.
AlexMuir 11y ago
The journey to learning vim is so long that people at different stages will have things set up differently. I'm still adding and removing things as I learn and understand them, or conversely, as I no longer need them. I'm not kidding when I say it's a 10-year learning curve.
towb 11y ago
Most code editors are half-useless by default though. I don't think anyone is using the default Atom or Sublime. It takes time to both tweak them and learn how to use them. So I don't think Vim is THAT different.
thachmai 11y ago
If there is only one thing I can complain about vim/vi, it's the esc key. The key is too far away to reach easily. It is most accessible with the little finger, which is our weakness finger. Coupled with the fact that it's likely the most important key in vim. I hate it. So when I use a non-configured vim, it's the thing that I miss the most. The rest is trivial. However, using someone else vim is completely different! You must keep in mind that vim is much similar to a programming language. You can remap keys all over the place. You can create exotic combinations that do wonderful and/or terrible things with few key strokes. You can install plugins that argument and alter vim behaviours. Jumping into a well tuned vim setup is not unsimilar to starting to use a new programming framework. It's hard to be productive right away. In that case usually, I just rename .vimrc, remap <esc>, do my things and get out of the way.
deleted 11y ago
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kylek 11y ago
The defaults are just fine. (As a sysadmin) I tend to work on systems that mostly aren't my own workstation and have never found it to be an issue (can't be arsed to push out my own config everywhere, not to mention other admins may not like what I like). I imagine it might be different for a coder...line numbers and pretty colors are nice I guess?
JupiterMoon 11y ago
I think of vim almost as two separate editors. (1) my setup which is customised exactly like I like it and borders onto a IDE and (2) default setup which I can happily use to edit a few config files.
ciupicri 11y ago
The default settings on Windows and Red Hat based systems are pretty good. On the other hand, I was very disappointed ~8 years ago when I touched an Ubuntu system. It was too plain for me.
deleted 11y ago
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adbachman 11y ago

For me, it's because I can. When I find a job I do often, I add it to the config, when I find a tool that makes a job easier I pick it up. Bare, freshly installed vim is quite useable, but is missing the affordances of my personally customized environment. It's kind of like the difference between being able to cook and walking into a strange kitchen and immediately knowing where everything is. In my home I'm comfortable, I know that the vegetable peeler is in a different drawer than the steak knives. In a friend's home, I'm just going to have to ask where something is every few minutes if I want to get work done.

dchest 11y ago

Correct, the defaults are indeed idiotic, probably because they are from the last century. I even have a freaking plugin installed to properly close buffers (https://github.com/cespare/vim-sbd/ https://github.com/cespare/vim-sbd/). It's indeed harder to use vim without my customizations. I guess it's more like a "build-your-own-editor from parts" kind of thing.

sean-duffy 11y ago

On my home machine I have a vimrc of about 30 lines, but I could do without most of it, I could probably reduce it to about 5 lines if I had to. So whenever I use vim on a computer at university or on a new machine in the workplace, as long as it has syntax highlighting and auto indent on, which it usually does, that's fine for me.

JD557 11y ago

The default vim config is pretty barebones. Actually, one of the main goals of Neovim[1] is to provide better defaults[2], such has syntax highlighting. [1] https://neovim.io/ https://neovim.io/ [2] https://github.com/neovim/neovim/issues/276 https://github.com/neovim/neovim/issues/276

oneJob 11y ago
Holy ish! Neovim has progressed so much. Exciting.
- JD557 11y ago
  I'm actually using it currently and I really enjoy the built-in terminal. It makes my workflow much better. Be aware that some plugins might have some bugs. I also got segfaults when using multiple terminals (although that's quite rare).
  - z1mm32m4n 11y ago
    Interesting. I tried out the built-in terminal and found that I couldn't navigate around panes as quickly as if I just used tmux instead. Are you using the default mappings, or have you made them easier to use somehow?
aeosynth 11y ago
The current defaults discussion is at https://github.com/neovim/neovim/issues/2676 https://github.com/neovim/neovim/issues/2676.

Widdershin 11y ago

Yes, the vim defaults suck. If you're building a new vimrc or want a common ground for pairing, I would recommend checking out [vim-sensible](https://github.com/tpope/vim-sensible https://github.com/tpope/vim-sensible) by tpope. It's a vim plugin that provides a set of sensible default options.

FireBeyond 11y ago
Vim Bootstrap (www.vim-bootstrap.com) is one I recently discovered and really like.

kosma 11y ago

Vim's default are indeed dumb, but what you described is not a vim-specific problem. Walk into any room full of coders and try to use their computers; you'll discover tons of weirdness that can't be explained by anything except by a desire to be treated like a princess.* Things like rebinding basic shortcuts, reversing the scroll direction (Mac users will get this), swapping Cmd/Ctrl, using some obscure shell or even infecting other people's machines with some haphazardly scp'd dotfiles. This kind of overcustomization is fine if you live in a basement and work on a project alone. As soon as you become a part of a team, please stop. You're making cooperation unnecessarily hard and spending company time on an optimization that isn't. *I sometimes joke that coders who refuse to conform to the industry standards should wear a tiara as an indication they are, indeed, unique snowflakes free from the usual social expectations. It seems to work.

nothrabannosir 11y ago
Wait, am I missing something obvious here, or are you seriously complaining about people reversing the scroll direction on their own computers?
- 0942v8653 11y ago
  Apple reverses scrolling by default. I don't know about other coders' computers, but there are people who don't know how to change it, and whenever I boot into recovery mode it gets reversed.
  - bandrami 11y ago
    It's only "reversed" if you consider the other direction "normal". Either one makes sense: Mac acts like your finger is moving the page itself; X11 and Windows act like your finger is moving the location indicator on the scrollbar. Either one makes sense a priori, but once you're used to one the other becomes intolerable.
    - eru 11y ago
      Nah, I change back and forth between Mac and Linux. It's bearable.

AlexMuir 11y ago

The journey to learning vim is so long that people at different stages will have things set up differently. I'm still adding and removing things as I learn and understand them, or conversely, as I no longer need them. I'm not kidding when I say it's a 10-year learning curve.

towb 11y ago

Most code editors are half-useless by default though. I don't think anyone is using the default Atom or Sublime. It takes time to both tweak them and learn how to use them. So I don't think Vim is THAT different.

thachmai 11y ago

If there is only one thing I can complain about vim/vi, it's the esc key. The key is too far away to reach easily. It is most accessible with the little finger, which is our weakness finger. Coupled with the fact that it's likely the most important key in vim. I hate it. So when I use a non-configured vim, it's the thing that I miss the most. The rest is trivial. However, using someone else vim is completely different! You must keep in mind that vim is much similar to a programming language. You can remap keys all over the place. You can create exotic combinations that do wonderful and/or terrible things with few key strokes. You can install plugins that argument and alter vim behaviours. Jumping into a well tuned vim setup is not unsimilar to starting to use a new programming framework. It's hard to be productive right away. In that case usually, I just rename .vimrc, remap <esc>, do my things and get out of the way.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

kylek 11y ago

The defaults are just fine. (As a sysadmin) I tend to work on systems that mostly aren't my own workstation and have never found it to be an issue (can't be arsed to push out my own config everywhere, not to mention other admins may not like what I like). I imagine it might be different for a coder...line numbers and pretty colors are nice I guess?

JupiterMoon 11y ago

I think of vim almost as two separate editors. (1) my setup which is customised exactly like I like it and borders onto a IDE and (2) default setup which I can happily use to edit a few config files.

ciupicri 11y ago

The default settings on Windows and Red Hat based systems are pretty good. On the other hand, I was very disappointed ~8 years ago when I touched an Ubuntu system. It was too plain for me.

deleted 11y ago

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