4 ms·

You use a tool enough and it shapes your way of thinking. It's like touch typing, you don't think about the individual keys you press. Instead you think about w

by doix 4y ago

You use a tool enough and it shapes your way of thinking. It's like touch typing, you don't think about the individual keys you press. Instead you think about what you're trying to say/code and muscle memory takes over. It's the same with vim. You start thinking "delete that word", or change everything until the '(' character. When you start thinking that way, changing the way you think becomes distracting. > It blows my mind that there's so much devotion to the tool first, problems second, which must be mashed into a shape that fits my tool. I see it more of a question of, do you change the way you think to match the tool? Or change the tool to match the way you think? I don't think there's necessarily a right or wrong answer, at some point I changed the way I think to match the vim model. Now I change things to match the vim model rather than change the way I think.

minusf 4y ago
i can't not explain in words what it's like to use vim for 20+ years, esp to someone thinking an editor is "just" a tool. my vim config changes with me... for some the journey is never the goal.
- EdwardDiego 4y ago
  I've used Vim since 1993, pretty sure it was 93, might have been 92, and it was probably just Vi initially, but then I progressed to Vim. And I still use it. So yeah, guess I haven't hit 20+ years, but I'm pretty damn close, and still not as committed to it as you are. Length of time using it doesn't correlate to passion.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - xanathar 4y ago
    If you started in 1992 you're at 30 years.
    - EdwardDiego 4y ago
      ... that's what I get for late- night commenting. (Also, 30 years? Christ I'm old.)
  - minusf 4y ago
    i'm not excluding anyone using it even for a day. i was trying to make a point that it's a tool with a very long history and all the time i "wasted" (and still waste) on learning it was well invested, as it's going nowhere and i spend 8-9h in it a working day. i think i've been using only a shell longer than vim.
EdwardDiego 4y ago
> You use a tool enough and it shapes your way of thinking. Yes, that's true. I can't fathom writing Java in anything other than Intellij because it's shaped my thinking to "my tool should already know what this symbol is, where it is, and what arguments it might take". I guess it's shaped my expectations more than my thinking, but I hope you see what I mean. > I see it more of a question of, do you change the way you think to match the tool? Or change the tool to match the way you think? Fair question. I guess my response is that one of the lessons I've learned the hard way in life is that my way of thinking can be wrong. And while I enjoy a tool you can tweak to your desired tolerances, I prefer to use the tool that is most closely aligned to the task at hand. You can get a nice even surface on a piece of timber using a chisel very carefully. Or, you can use a plane. You can cut down a tree with a stone lashed to a branch, or you can use an axe with a metal head. Or, a chainsaw. Changing between any of them requires a revision of how you think about the process, but it seems obvious that the cost of doing so might be worth it, even if the chainsaw requires changing how you think to incorporate concepts like kickback.
- lycopodiopsida 4y ago
  It is not clear to me, why people try to make an exception of an extremely IDE-centric language/tooling, such as java is, to an advantage of IDEs in general. There are other languages besides java and C#, where advantages of IDEA are small to none. For them, you have to accept a bloated project-based resource-consuming monster. Or you do not and just write rust in vim or emacs. In times of LSP and DAP the gap is getting smaller each day. But IDEA is not getting faster, and never will.
  - EdwardDiego 4y ago
    I primarily use IDEA to write Python at my current job. I've also used it for Go, JS, PHP on the odd occasion. > But IDEA is not getting faster I disagree, there's been several changes made I can think of to improve speed
- asdajksah2123 4y ago
  Isn't the whole article about how the author made his tool "most closely aligned to the task at hand"? Bonus points, since it's a flexible tool that can be aligned to most tasks, he is able to bring his specialized knowledge and experience of the tool to this specific task at hand as well. It's the best of all worlds!

by doix 4y ago

minusf 4y ago

i can't not explain in words what it's like to use vim for 20+ years, esp to someone thinking an editor is "just" a tool. my vim config changes with me... for some the journey is never the goal.

EdwardDiego 4y ago
I've used Vim since 1993, pretty sure it was 93, might have been 92, and it was probably just Vi initially, but then I progressed to Vim. And I still use it. So yeah, guess I haven't hit 20+ years, but I'm pretty damn close, and still not as committed to it as you are. Length of time using it doesn't correlate to passion.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- xanathar 4y ago
  If you started in 1992 you're at 30 years.
  - EdwardDiego 4y ago
    ... that's what I get for late- night commenting. (Also, 30 years? Christ I'm old.)
- minusf 4y ago
  i'm not excluding anyone using it even for a day. i was trying to make a point that it's a tool with a very long history and all the time i "wasted" (and still waste) on learning it was well invested, as it's going nowhere and i spend 8-9h in it a working day. i think i've been using only a shell longer than vim.

EdwardDiego 4y ago

> You use a tool enough and it shapes your way of thinking. Yes, that's true. I can't fathom writing Java in anything other than Intellij because it's shaped my thinking to "my tool should already know what this symbol is, where it is, and what arguments it might take". I guess it's shaped my expectations more than my thinking, but I hope you see what I mean. > I see it more of a question of, do you change the way you think to match the tool? Or change the tool to match the way you think? Fair question. I guess my response is that one of the lessons I've learned the hard way in life is that my way of thinking can be wrong. And while I enjoy a tool you can tweak to your desired tolerances, I prefer to use the tool that is most closely aligned to the task at hand. You can get a nice even surface on a piece of timber using a chisel very carefully. Or, you can use a plane. You can cut down a tree with a stone lashed to a branch, or you can use an axe with a metal head. Or, a chainsaw. Changing between any of them requires a revision of how you think about the process, but it seems obvious that the cost of doing so might be worth it, even if the chainsaw requires changing how you think to incorporate concepts like kickback.

lycopodiopsida 4y ago
It is not clear to me, why people try to make an exception of an extremely IDE-centric language/tooling, such as java is, to an advantage of IDEs in general. There are other languages besides java and C#, where advantages of IDEA are small to none. For them, you have to accept a bloated project-based resource-consuming monster. Or you do not and just write rust in vim or emacs. In times of LSP and DAP the gap is getting smaller each day. But IDEA is not getting faster, and never will.
- EdwardDiego 4y ago
  I primarily use IDEA to write Python at my current job. I've also used it for Go, JS, PHP on the odd occasion. > But IDEA is not getting faster I disagree, there's been several changes made I can think of to improve speed
asdajksah2123 4y ago
Isn't the whole article about how the author made his tool "most closely aligned to the task at hand"? Bonus points, since it's a flexible tool that can be aligned to most tasks, he is able to bring his specialized knowledge and experience of the tool to this specific task at hand as well. It's the best of all worlds!