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> We know that cognitive load is reduced by minimizing visual clutter Powerful tools unavoidably have a significant cognitive load. It’s quite possible to red

> We know that cognitive load is reduced by minimizing visual clutter Powerful tools unavoidably have a significant cognitive load. It’s quite possible to reduce that load by improving how some features work (for example, searchable command bars are better than endless menus) but if you’re not doing that you’re pretty much just reducing the power of the tool, as here.

fleshdaddy 3y ago
I would say there’s a difference between cognitive load and visual clutter. One of the problems I have with the visual studio UI is that it tries to be everyone’s everything…all at once. I much prefer the searchable command bar in VSCode because everything I need is just a hot key and a couple key strokes away but when I’m just using the editor I don’t have to sacrifice space or deal with sifting through icons to get to the only ones I need 90% of the time. That being said presumably the features are still there just hidden under a menu item or something. Ultimately it comes down to personal preference but I’ve basically gotten to the point where when I’m actually writing code I use VSCode and when I need access to more advanced tooling, or have to deal with some of our legacy build systems, I pop into visual studio proper. I think I’m just a bit more use to some of that dev tooling being outside of the editor but I would really love some bigger investments in the .NET dev tooling in VSCode and the .NET CLI so I can have an editor that’s just an editor most of the time and still be able to take advantage of the great debugger and everything else VS provides.
jen20 3y ago
vim focuses entirely on the content, by default with just two rows reserved for an editor interface. Emacs is similarly minimal. The lack of avoidance of cognitive load is a choice, not a necessity,
osigurdson 3y ago
Honestly though, hardly anything is needed when writing code. Find code, edit code, run code, debug code (step, inspect). I think something like Blender is a good example of a tool in which many menus are truly needed, but IDEs are simple in this regard.

fleshdaddy 3y ago

I would say there’s a difference between cognitive load and visual clutter. One of the problems I have with the visual studio UI is that it tries to be everyone’s everything…all at once. I much prefer the searchable command bar in VSCode because everything I need is just a hot key and a couple key strokes away but when I’m just using the editor I don’t have to sacrifice space or deal with sifting through icons to get to the only ones I need 90% of the time. That being said presumably the features are still there just hidden under a menu item or something. Ultimately it comes down to personal preference but I’ve basically gotten to the point where when I’m actually writing code I use VSCode and when I need access to more advanced tooling, or have to deal with some of our legacy build systems, I pop into visual studio proper. I think I’m just a bit more use to some of that dev tooling being outside of the editor but I would really love some bigger investments in the .NET dev tooling in VSCode and the .NET CLI so I can have an editor that’s just an editor most of the time and still be able to take advantage of the great debugger and everything else VS provides.

jen20 3y ago

vim focuses entirely on the content, by default with just two rows reserved for an editor interface. Emacs is similarly minimal. The lack of avoidance of cognitive load is a choice, not a necessity,

osigurdson 3y ago

Honestly though, hardly anything is needed when writing code. Find code, edit code, run code, debug code (step, inspect). I think something like Blender is a good example of a tool in which many menus are truly needed, but IDEs are simple in this regard.