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Mainstream editors get close to Vim only if you use Vim as it were a mainstream editor. Yes, on a mainstream editor you can use Ctrl+Shift+Arrow to select words
by lelele 14y ago
Mainstream editors get close to Vim only if you use Vim as it were a mainstream editor. Yes, on a mainstream editor you can use Ctrl+Shift+Arrow to select words - which already requires you to move your hands way more than Vim would - but - among other things - how do you cut/change/copy text:
- up to a specific character?
- up to a specific string?
- up to the beginning/end of a document?
- up to the beginning/end of a sentence?
- up to the beginning/end of a paragraph?
Good luck ;-) Maybe these examples are lame because I haven't edited text in a while and I couldn't think of anything better, but I hope you can see what we are talking about.
Read PG's essay about Blub languages and Lisp, then replace Blub with mainstream editors and Lisp with Vim and you'll understand why Vim is better. My colleagues used to ask me why I kept using a weird editor, and when I answered they replied the same way you have done, yet they always marveled at me editing texts at insane speeds. Go figure.
With Vim, you also have a reduced mental load, as its command set relies on intuitive and flexible composition.
Actually I don't even use Vim. I use a Vim mode for GNU Emacs, which gives me these added advantages:
- learning a Lisp (ask Eric Raymond why this is advantageous);
- having a powerful batch text processing tool (no need for Perl, Awk, and the likes);
- a box of tools for several tasks which are more powerful than mainstream ones.
Have fun.
- calinet6 14y agoI love how every Vim user speaks to non-Vim users as though they're novices that are just "not there yet." It's cute.
- lelele 14y agoNon-Vim users are novices that are just "not there yet", when it comes to text-editing. The Vim way is the most simple and effective way to edit text by means of a keyboard. Like Lisp and the Dvorak keyboard, it's alien, but it's actually simpler. Maybe, now that touch-screens are becoming commonplace, an equally or more effective new way will be developed.
- swah 14y agoMy guess is GP knows how to use Vim, and yet he's happy to use something else... but many Vim users can't imagine that scenario. I personally know and like Vim and Emacs, but I'm using ST2 because those editors lose some of their greatness on vanilla Windows. And Emacs keybindings do hurt my wrists. Also, I could never get really fast at editing multiple files inside a single Vim session. Nothing near Emacs with ido.el or vanilla ST2. I already tried Lusty* packages and Nerd* packages... It's also kinda hard to prevent :q from quitting the whole editor, which always bugged me. When I open it from the terminal for a quick fix on a single file, Vim works very naturally and I think, once more, "hey that edit was easy and fast - why not switch to it as my main editor?"...
- lelele 14y agoWell, there is Vim and there is the Vi-editing style. My understanding was we were talking about the latter. In such case, I admit I couldn't think of a proficient Vi-clone user switching to any other editing model.
- lelele 14y agoYou've proved my point. In your words Vi-style editing is "natural", "easy" and "fast". Vi-style is better than Emacs-style because the latter "do hurt my wrists", thus discarding the only worthy contender. The only reason you are using another editing model is because you've found the tools offering Vi-style editing to be lacking in important areas. Sublime may be better than Vim as an overall editor in your particular case even when the editing model of Sublime is less efficient than the one of Vim. We agree on this: we don't live in a perfect world. Indeed, even Vi-style editing is not perfect, as it was designed for a different keyboard than those which are commonplace nowadays.
- swah 14y agoRIght, right. Unfortunately I can't convince my brain to accept that Sublime+Vintage works like Vim. I need to be in Vim to trigger the Vim mode of thinking in my brain... I'm curious though: I thought it was Emacs that had a special keyboard in the old days. What do you think could be easier in Vim with a different keyboard? (I can only think of ESC position).