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Zed seems like its gotten a lot of buzz on HN, and its great to see new players in the space. For those who have used it, what are some of the killer features?

by lbhdc 2y ago

threatofrain 2y ago
No killer features, just nice ergonomics and speed out of the box. I use it as my Vim replacement.
- boomskats 2y ago
  Do you find it to be faster than vim/neovim?
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - vehemenz 2y ago
    The Vim emulation is pretty far behind JetBrains, VSCode, and Sublime Text. I wouldn't compare it to Vim as a replacement at this point.
- renewiltord 2y ago
  Do you use it for Rust? Does it do "Show usages" well when the usages are through a macro?
- nickorlow 2y ago
  What motivated you to switch to it from vim?
choilive 2y ago
Its killer feature seems to be speed. Otherwise I dont see much of a reason to use it over VS Code.
- gavmor 2y ago
  Have you had much success with VS Code's multiplayer extensions? I've found them buggy to the point of useless, but maybe things have improved. Zed, on the otherhand, is developed by people who understand pair programming, which is my priority.
  - choilive 2y ago
    No not much experience there since multiplayer editing has never really been a part of my personal workflow (mostly a lot of screensharing), but I can definitely see that being useful for people that use it regularly.
  - cmiles74 2y ago
    Not the OP but I tried hard, looking for an easy pair programming solution. Worked decently a couple of times and inexplicably failed most of the time.
    - gavmor 2y ago
      This is why I'm excited to try Zed. I regularly "pair" via Pop, but keybindings and lag make it hard to switch seats, so we basically decide at the beginning of the session who is going to hog the keyboard, and that's a crippling dynamic.
- griftrejection 2y ago
  [dead]
nequo 2y ago
Besides speed, the other killer feature that Zed focuses on is collaborative editing: https://zed.dev/docs/channels https://zed.dev/docs/channels
wolfadex 2y ago
For me the "killer feature" is a graphical editor (like VSCode or the Jet Brains editors) but with performance more like vim. I'm also very much enjoying the modal editing, which VSCode lacks.
- thesuperbigfrog 2y ago
  >> I'm also very much enjoying the modal editing, which VSCode lacks. The VSCode Vim plugin works great: https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=vscodevim.vim https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=vscodevi...
  - 3836293648 2y ago
    The VSC Vim plugin barely works with default keybinds and not at all as soon as you start modifying it. It's also super slow
  - wolfadex 2y ago
    When I specified the modal editing I was referring to how the workspace search in Zed brings up each result in an editable "window" allowing me to make edits across my whole project from 1 tab. VSCode's workspace search feels much more limited in comparison.
    - thesuperbigfrog 2y ago
      That sounds like an interesting feature. Could you provide a link that gives more information about it? I am not finding it in the docs.
      - wolfadex 2y ago
        I'm not seeing it in the docs, maybe I should write up a little something on my editing experience! Also to correct my self, I think I mistakenly said `modal` when I should have said `buffer` earlier. So searching across the project brings up your results in multiple buffers, each about 5 lines (expandable to more) and you can do all of your normal editing within each/all of the buffers. If I happen to write something up, I'll try and remember to share it in this thread.
drcongo 2y ago
I use it as my secondary editor (after Sublime) but could easily see myself switching in the not too distant future. It's incredibly fast, possibly even more so than Sublime, and really well designed. While the UI design of an editor is possibly not that important to a lot of people, I find it really matters to me for unknown brain reasons, I get anxious if I ever have to use VS Code as it has zero attention to design details. I'm really pleased for the Zed team on reaching this milestone. I think the only thing holding me back from it being my daily driver is the built-in Pyright (which I hate) and lack of Ruff support.
pcthrowaway 2y ago
I haven't used Zed in the last year, but Zed's search across codebase display was divine. I don't want to necessarily open the file when looking at search results to see additional context in the matching sections. Zed brings up a view with all the results where you can expand context, and IIRC even edit in the results panel without having to open the entire file. It's also collaboration-first, and unlike VS code, I believe the software behind collaboration mode is open source
barrell 2y ago
For me, a couple things; - fast enough to compete with neovim. Idk if it’s my previous interest in display engineering, but I substantially notice the speed - vim bindings…. Satisfactory. I don’t struggle to navigate at all, feels pretty native to me. I can split panes every which way till Sunday - collaboration mode is pretty great - Ability to have your current pane magnified - Ability to set your terminal font size to a different font size than your editor (been looking for this for years in a terminal emulator) - Super clean and crisp ui. TBH it was too much ui when I first tried it, I stopped using it almost immediately. But I have it a second try and got used to it. It’s still a lot more than vim but hey - Outline mode (pretty sweet) - Multi-file buffers (makes editing text across multiple files stupidly easy) - Cracked team. Awesome people, super transparent, just some sick engineers doing sick engineering

Zed seems like its gotten a lot of buzz on HN, and its great to see new players in the space. For those who have used it, what are some of the killer features?

by lbhdc 2y ago

Zed seems like its gotten a lot of buzz on HN, and its great to see new players in the space. For those who have used it, what are some of the killer features?

threatofrain 2y ago

No killer features, just nice ergonomics and speed out of the box. I use it as my Vim replacement.

boomskats 2y ago
Do you find it to be faster than vim/neovim?
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- vehemenz 2y ago
  The Vim emulation is pretty far behind JetBrains, VSCode, and Sublime Text. I wouldn't compare it to Vim as a replacement at this point.
renewiltord 2y ago
Do you use it for Rust? Does it do "Show usages" well when the usages are through a macro?
nickorlow 2y ago
What motivated you to switch to it from vim?

choilive 2y ago

Its killer feature seems to be speed. Otherwise I dont see much of a reason to use it over VS Code.

gavmor 2y ago
Have you had much success with VS Code's multiplayer extensions? I've found them buggy to the point of useless, but maybe things have improved. Zed, on the otherhand, is developed by people who understand pair programming, which is my priority.
- choilive 2y ago
  No not much experience there since multiplayer editing has never really been a part of my personal workflow (mostly a lot of screensharing), but I can definitely see that being useful for people that use it regularly.
- cmiles74 2y ago
  Not the OP but I tried hard, looking for an easy pair programming solution. Worked decently a couple of times and inexplicably failed most of the time.
  - gavmor 2y ago
    This is why I'm excited to try Zed. I regularly "pair" via Pop, but keybindings and lag make it hard to switch seats, so we basically decide at the beginning of the session who is going to hog the keyboard, and that's a crippling dynamic.
griftrejection 2y ago
[dead]

nequo 2y ago

Besides speed, the other killer feature that Zed focuses on is collaborative editing: https://zed.dev/docs/channels https://zed.dev/docs/channels

wolfadex 2y ago

For me the "killer feature" is a graphical editor (like VSCode or the Jet Brains editors) but with performance more like vim. I'm also very much enjoying the modal editing, which VSCode lacks.

thesuperbigfrog 2y ago
>> I'm also very much enjoying the modal editing, which VSCode lacks. The VSCode Vim plugin works great: https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=vscodevim.vim https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=vscodevi...
- 3836293648 2y ago
  The VSC Vim plugin barely works with default keybinds and not at all as soon as you start modifying it. It's also super slow
- wolfadex 2y ago
  When I specified the modal editing I was referring to how the workspace search in Zed brings up each result in an editable "window" allowing me to make edits across my whole project from 1 tab. VSCode's workspace search feels much more limited in comparison.
  - thesuperbigfrog 2y ago
    That sounds like an interesting feature. Could you provide a link that gives more information about it? I am not finding it in the docs.
    - wolfadex 2y ago
      I'm not seeing it in the docs, maybe I should write up a little something on my editing experience! Also to correct my self, I think I mistakenly said `modal` when I should have said `buffer` earlier. So searching across the project brings up your results in multiple buffers, each about 5 lines (expandable to more) and you can do all of your normal editing within each/all of the buffers. If I happen to write something up, I'll try and remember to share it in this thread.

drcongo 2y ago

I use it as my secondary editor (after Sublime) but could easily see myself switching in the not too distant future. It's incredibly fast, possibly even more so than Sublime, and really well designed. While the UI design of an editor is possibly not that important to a lot of people, I find it really matters to me for unknown brain reasons, I get anxious if I ever have to use VS Code as it has zero attention to design details. I'm really pleased for the Zed team on reaching this milestone. I think the only thing holding me back from it being my daily driver is the built-in Pyright (which I hate) and lack of Ruff support.

pcthrowaway 2y ago

I haven't used Zed in the last year, but Zed's search across codebase display was divine. I don't want to necessarily open the file when looking at search results to see additional context in the matching sections. Zed brings up a view with all the results where you can expand context, and IIRC even edit in the results panel without having to open the entire file. It's also collaboration-first, and unlike VS code, I believe the software behind collaboration mode is open source

barrell 2y ago

For me, a couple things; - fast enough to compete with neovim. Idk if it’s my previous interest in display engineering, but I substantially notice the speed - vim bindings…. Satisfactory. I don’t struggle to navigate at all, feels pretty native to me. I can split panes every which way till Sunday - collaboration mode is pretty great - Ability to have your current pane magnified - Ability to set your terminal font size to a different font size than your editor (been looking for this for years in a terminal emulator) - Super clean and crisp ui. TBH it was too much ui when I first tried it, I stopped using it almost immediately. But I have it a second try and got used to it. It’s still a lot more than vim but hey - Outline mode (pretty sweet) - Multi-file buffers (makes editing text across multiple files stupidly easy) - Cracked team. Awesome people, super transparent, just some sick engineers doing sick engineering