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Ask HN: What was wrong with syntax-directed editors for programming?
And does a dislike for these translate to a dislike for structured editors for math/scientific documents (e.g., TeXmacs)?
- dtagames 4y agoIsn't VSCode with Copilot (or even with Intellisense) a "syntax-directed" editor in modern terms? Those tools are helpful precisely because they understand the AST of the underlying language. They can often suggest correct code that should come next. And they're wildly popular. Am I missing something?
- amichail 4y agoSyntax directed editors often limited what you type to valid syntax and automatically provided appropriate indentation. There is less freedom while editing as a result.
- bjourne 4y agoProblems come when you want to violate the rules of the grammar. Perhaps you want to use a recent syntactic construct in the language not yet supported by the editor. Or perhaps certain escape sequences and/or quotation marks confuses the editor.