5 ms·

This is really great. I’ve recently switched to Helix editor after 10 years of vim and haven’t looked back. If you’re looking for something a bit simpler, zero

by alxmng 4y ago

This is really great. I’ve recently switched to Helix editor after 10 years of vim and haven’t looked back. If you’re looking for something a bit simpler, zero configuration, but with the same philosophy as vim (select -> action) give it a try.

johntb86 4y ago
Are there any good VSCode extensions that support helix-style input?
- sp33der89 4y ago
  Yes, you'll have to tweak the default keybindings a bit to match Helix but I am using dance successfully: https://github.com/71/dance https://github.com/71/dance
dragonelite 4y ago
Im also in the process of switching to Helix and Zellij. I like the minimal configuration of Helix compared to going through multiple git repos just to find the needed neovim config and adjust them to taste.
- jalino23 4y ago
  Holy cow I switch to Helix a couple months ago but its my first time hearing about Zellij and wow this is too powerful with Helix! thank you so much for this!!!!!
  - istjohn 4y ago
    Zellij just looks like Tmux with tabs. Am I missing something?
    - imsnif 4y ago
      Yes: https://zellij.dev/tutorials/basic-functionality/ https://zellij.dev/tutorials/basic-functionality/
Galanwe 4y ago
What annoyed me with helix was that invisible characters are treated the same as characters. That means your cursor can be positioned after the end of the line, on the '\n' and just sit there. For instance, if you press "A", you are now after the \n of the end of line, and pressing backspace will remove the \n, joining with the line below. I tried to ask whether that peculiar behavior could be toggled off somehow, but was welcomed by a wall of extreme purism on how treating differently visible and invisible characters would break the character model of the editor... I'm too old to entertain the argument, and will just stick back to vim. Maybe its character model is unpure, but at least it's understandable by a mere mortal like me.
- pdobsan 4y ago
  There is a pending pull request partially addressing this: https://github.com/helix-editor/helix/pull/4204 It would be nice to have a comprehensive and convincing explanation in the documentation which sheds lights at the advantages of helix's treating lines. Maybe we vim old timers could learn something new and make a more informed decision about switching to helix.
- archseer 4y ago
  Treating newlines as regular characters allows you to use them in motions: t<Enter> will select text until end of the line for example.
lawn 4y ago
But the massive plugin ecosystem and the endless configuration possibilities is part of the charm!
mi_lk 4y ago
> with the same philosophy as vim (select -> action) but Vim is not select -> action? say `d2w` (to delete two words after the cursor) it's action then selection
johncoltrane 4y ago
> with the same philosophy as vim (select -> action) "select->action" is definitely possible thanks to visual mode but it certainly is not Vim's "philosophy", which would be more in the line of "action->object".
- alxmng 4y ago
  Ha yes, I meant to say opposite philosophy, ugh. Vim is command -> object but Helix it’s the other way around. In Helix you select first then do something.
jb3689 4y ago
Zero configuration sounds like the opposite of why I like vim. I want things to work exactly how I want them to work. Vim’s composability of normal, day-to-day actions you already know is its best feature

by alxmng 4y ago

johntb86 4y ago

Are there any good VSCode extensions that support helix-style input?

sp33der89 4y ago
Yes, you'll have to tweak the default keybindings a bit to match Helix but I am using dance successfully: https://github.com/71/dance https://github.com/71/dance

dragonelite 4y ago

Im also in the process of switching to Helix and Zellij. I like the minimal configuration of Helix compared to going through multiple git repos just to find the needed neovim config and adjust them to taste.

jalino23 4y ago
Holy cow I switch to Helix a couple months ago but its my first time hearing about Zellij and wow this is too powerful with Helix! thank you so much for this!!!!!
- istjohn 4y ago
  Zellij just looks like Tmux with tabs. Am I missing something?
  - imsnif 4y ago
    Yes: https://zellij.dev/tutorials/basic-functionality/ https://zellij.dev/tutorials/basic-functionality/

Galanwe 4y ago

What annoyed me with helix was that invisible characters are treated the same as characters. That means your cursor can be positioned after the end of the line, on the '\n' and just sit there. For instance, if you press "A", you are now after the \n of the end of line, and pressing backspace will remove the \n, joining with the line below. I tried to ask whether that peculiar behavior could be toggled off somehow, but was welcomed by a wall of extreme purism on how treating differently visible and invisible characters would break the character model of the editor... I'm too old to entertain the argument, and will just stick back to vim. Maybe its character model is unpure, but at least it's understandable by a mere mortal like me.

pdobsan 4y ago
There is a pending pull request partially addressing this: https://github.com/helix-editor/helix/pull/4204 It would be nice to have a comprehensive and convincing explanation in the documentation which sheds lights at the advantages of helix's treating lines. Maybe we vim old timers could learn something new and make a more informed decision about switching to helix.
archseer 4y ago
Treating newlines as regular characters allows you to use them in motions: t<Enter> will select text until end of the line for example.

lawn 4y ago

But the massive plugin ecosystem and the endless configuration possibilities is part of the charm!

mi_lk 4y ago

> with the same philosophy as vim (select -> action) but Vim is not select -> action? say `d2w` (to delete two words after the cursor) it's action then selection

johncoltrane 4y ago

> with the same philosophy as vim (select -> action) "select->action" is definitely possible thanks to visual mode but it certainly is not Vim's "philosophy", which would be more in the line of "action->object".

alxmng 4y ago
Ha yes, I meant to say opposite philosophy, ugh. Vim is command -> object but Helix it’s the other way around. In Helix you select first then do something.

jb3689 4y ago

Zero configuration sounds like the opposite of why I like vim. I want things to work exactly how I want them to work. Vim’s composability of normal, day-to-day actions you already know is its best feature