28 ms·

> If you don't use either Vim or Emacs... that's harder. Honestly, it's full on "hacker heresy", but who would, at this point? That's part of the disconnect.

by Jetrel 5y ago

> If you don't use either Vim or Emacs... that's harder. Honestly, it's full on "hacker heresy", but who would, at this point? That's part of the disconnect. The current generation (hell, the last 3-4 generations of programmers) has earnestly given vim/emacs a fair shake and found the whole paradigm of CLI editors wanting. And that's old news; that shoe dropped a couple decades ago. To them it's not a serious tool; it's a "toy" you dabble in for historical re-enactment like you would with film photography versus digital. Or like writing traditional console games in assembly. A curio. There were real advantages to oldschool CLI editors, and it's not like they've gone away, but the world moved on. GUI editors have grown so many of their own advantages that you'd have to live without that it stopped being worth it a long time ago. Hacker heresy, like I said, but it's exactly that sense of "things you're not allowed to say" that breeds the disconnect of "why isn't anyone using this?" I wouldn't be surprised if someone has a solid VSCode language server for LISP out there, and it'd be damned ironic — but not surprising — if something like that grew legs with the traditional community being completely oblivious to its existence.

nerdponx 5y ago
For what it's worth, Neovim has at least 3 solid open-source GUI frontends, a closed-source full-fledged IDE, and at least 2 more experimental open-source ones. And your guess about LSP is exactly why I think Swank not having a protocol is such a problem. It discourages entry and expansion.
Zababa 5y ago
I don't think that's true. I'm in this current generation, I use VSCode for almost everything, and I don't see Emacs and Vim as toys. I see them however as a very large timesink, and I don't know if it's the best way to invest my time. Grinding leetcode and studying system design can get me into a big company that pays very well, almost 5 times more than what I make currently. Learning about JS, the web in general, the cloud can be used in my day job, and can allow me to easily spin up my own product. Learning about technical writing and blogging can increase the value of my "personal brand". Learning about people and how to navigate an organization will be useful wherever I am. Contributing to open source can also help my "personal brand", and it gives me a sense of accomplishment. And that's only for the "work" part of my life. I don't think Emacs and/or Vim are a good investment compared to those other things. On the other hand, I know that a lot of people use them, and like them, and I respect that. If I could take a pill to instantly know how to use efficiently one of them, I would. But right now, they're far from a priority.
Jach 5y ago
Ah yes, the last 3-4 generations of programmers that have lived and died out in only 8 years. Behold the most popular editor chosen by 1366 programmers on HN in 2012 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3717754 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3717754 is none other than vim. Sure, basically no one uses vi. vim is not vi. There is an LSP backend for Common Lisp (two actually if memory serves) that probably just wraps the venerable Swank, but I haven't tried it. I like vim + slimv + all my other plugins.

by Jetrel 5y ago

nerdponx 5y ago

For what it's worth, Neovim has at least 3 solid open-source GUI frontends, a closed-source full-fledged IDE, and at least 2 more experimental open-source ones. And your guess about LSP is exactly why I think Swank not having a protocol is such a problem. It discourages entry and expansion.

Zababa 5y ago

I don't think that's true. I'm in this current generation, I use VSCode for almost everything, and I don't see Emacs and Vim as toys. I see them however as a very large timesink, and I don't know if it's the best way to invest my time. Grinding leetcode and studying system design can get me into a big company that pays very well, almost 5 times more than what I make currently. Learning about JS, the web in general, the cloud can be used in my day job, and can allow me to easily spin up my own product. Learning about technical writing and blogging can increase the value of my "personal brand". Learning about people and how to navigate an organization will be useful wherever I am. Contributing to open source can also help my "personal brand", and it gives me a sense of accomplishment. And that's only for the "work" part of my life. I don't think Emacs and/or Vim are a good investment compared to those other things. On the other hand, I know that a lot of people use them, and like them, and I respect that. If I could take a pill to instantly know how to use efficiently one of them, I would. But right now, they're far from a priority.

Jach 5y ago

Ah yes, the last 3-4 generations of programmers that have lived and died out in only 8 years. Behold the most popular editor chosen by 1366 programmers on HN in 2012 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3717754 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3717754 is none other than vim. Sure, basically no one uses vi. vim is not vi. There is an LSP backend for Common Lisp (two actually if memory serves) that probably just wraps the venerable Swank, but I haven't tried it. I like vim + slimv + all my other plugins.