5 ms·

I love vim and I’m happy Chris stepped in to save the project, his vim CSV plugin is something I use daily. Though I really hope vim and neovim merge, I don’t

I love vim and I’m happy Chris stepped in to save the project, his vim CSV plugin is something I use daily. Though I really hope vim and neovim merge, I don’t see a reason for the two projects to stay separate.

freedomben 2y ago
I have had similar thoughts, and have even theorized that the two would merge at some point. But that said, The goals of the two projects are still pretty different. It sounds like Vim proper is going to start receiving More new features, but overall it still has a significant focus on stability. I do wonder if that will shift as the new maintainers get more and more confident and capable in the code base. Once that occurs, I suspect that neovim will start to look really good, even perhaps including to the vim proper maintainers. What might be a big difference though and a big enough stumbling block to prevent merging is the fact that neovim code base has been refactored extensively and updated. Having worked in a big project that was refactored without me, and then returned, it is actually worse than a new code base because you feel like you should know where things are, but they aren't there. It continually misleads you and wastes your time. I could see that frustration being enough to keep the them proper people from merging or moving to neovim.
mkozlows 2y ago
Given what he's saying here -- that Vim is in "maintenance mode" -- I don't think you'll need any formal merge. Neovim is just where all new development is done, and it'll slowly replace traditional Vim over time.
- meitham 2y ago
  I'm not sure admins of old mainframes from the 80s would be interested in getting latest vim running on their hosts! I still use whatever old version of vim that came with my freenas.
  - mkozlows 2y ago
    I mean, sure. But like, vim never merged with vi, either -- to this day, you can find old things that are still running pre-vim versions of vi. It's just that over time, more and more things switched their default version of vi to vim, just as over time, more and more things will switch their default version of vim to neovim.
  - Keyframe 2y ago
    vi != vim
  - skissane 2y ago
    > I'm not sure admins of old mainframes from the 80s would be interested in getting latest vim running on their hosts! I doubt many 1980s mainframes were ever capable of running vim. People on 80s mainframes generally used mainframe text editors such as ISPF Edit (on MVS) or XEDIT (on VM/CMS) Vim’s makefile does have support in it for compiling on Amdahl UTS, Amdahl’s Unix port for IBM-compatible mainframes, and so possibly vim could have run on an 80s mainframe running UTS. However, I’m sceptical there are any mainframes left running UTS anywhere on this planet-nobody uses it in production any more (apparently the last production users were some US telcos in the first decade of this century). I doubt any of the small number of still-working 80s/90s IBM(-compatible) mainframe systems in hobbyist or museum hands run it. There is a version available online you can run in an emulator, but it is an ancient version from the 1970s, whereas I believe the vim port is to a newer 1990s version-and I don’t believe any of those newer UTS versions are publicly available-either they survive in some private collection, or they’ve already been lost to the sands of time.
- mi_lk 2y ago
  > Neovim is just where all new development is done, and it'll slowly replace traditional Vim over time. Nailed it. Bram made the decision on his own and vim's fate is stuck with it. I was bitter about it but now I think it's best for both communities.
- johnea 2y ago
  "replace" ha ha! Not likely. The directions for the projects seem pretty distinct. It should be noted that some original vi are still installed by default when installing some OSs. The whole idea that a project needs to be in constant new-feature mode is just not reality. Just as one example: I'm still using the fluxbox desktop (about 25 years now), and it still meets my top level GUI needs for interacting with my workstation. I don't really _want_ it to change. I want the UI to be exactly the same after an update, so as not to disrupt my workflow.
  - wruza 2y ago
    Yep. It's not that text editing changed much since <yearnumber>. And the more years passed, the less there is to "feature". Projects with constant new features after many years of development demonstrably don't know what they need and how to let themselves pause and reflect.
  - lenkite 2y ago
    It is extremely likely that the default distribution of vimwill be neovim and not vim after a decade. Just like vim replaced vi, neovim will gradually replace vim. Being maintenance-mode software means only greybeards (and some stubborn holdouts) will stick to it over time and as greybeards retire, the new maintainers of linux distributions who are more familiar with neovim will make their choice.
    - cess11 2y ago
      Vim and nvim are different and have different goals. One is for people that enjoy Lua, the other is vim.
- wruza 2y ago
  Or it will meet the issues all "new development" projects meet and live through its first crises. Cause having new features comes at a cost, and people eventually grow tired of costs they can't just throw money at.
- menaerus 2y ago
  I am a long-time vim user and haven't had time to watch neovim developments more closely. What would be the incentive to move to Neovim, e.g. what are its best-selling features that vim doesn't have? Genuine question.
  - juanrgar 2y ago
    It's 'native' LSP for me. I have coc.nvim in Vim and it's great, but it depends on nodejs. Tree-sitter is another good one, although in my experience it might increase CPU usage noticeably.
    - menaerus 2y ago
      I usually only have LSP for a single language so coc is not of much use for me. Syntax highlighting rendering engine in vim OTOH could use some speed improvements. I see it drowning sometimes on larger files with sematic syntax highlighting.
  - petepete 2y ago
    For me it's Tree-sitter support. It builds a syntax tree for your files incredibly fast and allows the editor to use it for various things, including much better syntax highlighting. https://tree-sitter.github.io/tree-sitter/ https://tree-sitter.github.io/tree-sitter/
3eb7988a1663 2y ago
I do not believe that is possible without compromising the goals of one of the two projects. Vim is expected to continue to work everywhere, even on some bank's circa 1980 mainframe. NeoVIM has become an effort to revitalize the project. Support for ancient systems was tossed almost immediately (eg no more 8.3 filename support code). NeoVIM also included some much improved default configuration values.
- dleeftink 2y ago
  > even on some bank's circa 1980 mainframe Continuity I get, but how much are we collectively burdened by having a few ancient uses determine the wants of the many?
  - Out_of_Characte 2y ago
    Our window of compatibility only seems to grow larger over time. Old systems mostly get replaced when they lose function or the replacement becomes cheaper. But the replacement usually expects to last slightly longer than what its replacing. We've seen this slowly creep up in home computers, phones and even servers. I would argue that this is a function of small incremental improvements in everything from hard drives to computing. Lots of designs from the past can no longer connect to the internet in a meaningfull capacity but new hardware today might meaningfully last far longer than the developers could even anticipate.
  - kstrauser 2y ago
    I wonder about that, too. Not that anyone's beating my door down to port my own projects to zOS or anything, but I consider modern Linux/BSD to be my baseline target for all new code I write. If it runs well on amd64/aarch64 Linux, Mac, and {Free,Open}BSD, that's enough. Well, and Windows, if someone makes it run there and it's not onerous to support. I wouldn't accept patches that make it harder to build or maintain on those primary systems. It's not that I actively hate anything that isn't a recent 64-bit Unix, but that the people on other systems are either 1) hobbyists who are competent to port stuff to their own systems, or 2) companies who aren't paying me for extraordinary support. Bummer if something I wrote last week doesn't run on HP-UX, but it's not going to cost me sleep.
umbs 2y ago
"... vim and neovim merge,..." This seems very unlikely. In neovim help docs there's a paragraph in file `nvim.txt` Nvim is emphatically a fork of Vim, not a clone: compatibility with Vim (especially editor and Vimscript features) is maintained where possible. See |vim differences| for the complete reference of differencesfrom Vim. nvim maintainers believe the project diverged and compatibility is best effort at this stage. Essentially, there's no plan to merge the two projects at this stage and the benefits are not evident.
glaucon 2y ago
> Though I really hope vim and neovim merge I hope that if they do merge that the connection to ICCF Holland is maintained. Every time you start vim (without specifying a file) you see the message "Help poor children in Uganda!". It's been a salutary thing over the years to see Bram building something as amazing as vim and maintaining the commitment to helping orphaned kids in Uganda, I would be sad if that disappeared under the neovim bus. If you're a vim user and you'd like to support Bram's vision, here's the link https://iccf-holland.org/donate.html https://iccf-holland.org/donate.html .

freedomben 2y ago

I have had similar thoughts, and have even theorized that the two would merge at some point. But that said, The goals of the two projects are still pretty different. It sounds like Vim proper is going to start receiving More new features, but overall it still has a significant focus on stability. I do wonder if that will shift as the new maintainers get more and more confident and capable in the code base. Once that occurs, I suspect that neovim will start to look really good, even perhaps including to the vim proper maintainers. What might be a big difference though and a big enough stumbling block to prevent merging is the fact that neovim code base has been refactored extensively and updated. Having worked in a big project that was refactored without me, and then returned, it is actually worse than a new code base because you feel like you should know where things are, but they aren't there. It continually misleads you and wastes your time. I could see that frustration being enough to keep the them proper people from merging or moving to neovim.

mkozlows 2y ago

Given what he's saying here -- that Vim is in "maintenance mode" -- I don't think you'll need any formal merge. Neovim is just where all new development is done, and it'll slowly replace traditional Vim over time.

meitham 2y ago
I'm not sure admins of old mainframes from the 80s would be interested in getting latest vim running on their hosts! I still use whatever old version of vim that came with my freenas.
- mkozlows 2y ago
  I mean, sure. But like, vim never merged with vi, either -- to this day, you can find old things that are still running pre-vim versions of vi. It's just that over time, more and more things switched their default version of vi to vim, just as over time, more and more things will switch their default version of vim to neovim.
- Keyframe 2y ago
  vi != vim
- skissane 2y ago
  > I'm not sure admins of old mainframes from the 80s would be interested in getting latest vim running on their hosts! I doubt many 1980s mainframes were ever capable of running vim. People on 80s mainframes generally used mainframe text editors such as ISPF Edit (on MVS) or XEDIT (on VM/CMS) Vim’s makefile does have support in it for compiling on Amdahl UTS, Amdahl’s Unix port for IBM-compatible mainframes, and so possibly vim could have run on an 80s mainframe running UTS. However, I’m sceptical there are any mainframes left running UTS anywhere on this planet-nobody uses it in production any more (apparently the last production users were some US telcos in the first decade of this century). I doubt any of the small number of still-working 80s/90s IBM(-compatible) mainframe systems in hobbyist or museum hands run it. There is a version available online you can run in an emulator, but it is an ancient version from the 1970s, whereas I believe the vim port is to a newer 1990s version-and I don’t believe any of those newer UTS versions are publicly available-either they survive in some private collection, or they’ve already been lost to the sands of time.
mi_lk 2y ago
> Neovim is just where all new development is done, and it'll slowly replace traditional Vim over time. Nailed it. Bram made the decision on his own and vim's fate is stuck with it. I was bitter about it but now I think it's best for both communities.
johnea 2y ago
"replace" ha ha! Not likely. The directions for the projects seem pretty distinct. It should be noted that some original vi are still installed by default when installing some OSs. The whole idea that a project needs to be in constant new-feature mode is just not reality. Just as one example: I'm still using the fluxbox desktop (about 25 years now), and it still meets my top level GUI needs for interacting with my workstation. I don't really _want_ it to change. I want the UI to be exactly the same after an update, so as not to disrupt my workflow.
- wruza 2y ago
  Yep. It's not that text editing changed much since <yearnumber>. And the more years passed, the less there is to "feature". Projects with constant new features after many years of development demonstrably don't know what they need and how to let themselves pause and reflect.
- lenkite 2y ago
  It is extremely likely that the default distribution of vimwill be neovim and not vim after a decade. Just like vim replaced vi, neovim will gradually replace vim. Being maintenance-mode software means only greybeards (and some stubborn holdouts) will stick to it over time and as greybeards retire, the new maintainers of linux distributions who are more familiar with neovim will make their choice.
  - cess11 2y ago
    Vim and nvim are different and have different goals. One is for people that enjoy Lua, the other is vim.
wruza 2y ago
Or it will meet the issues all "new development" projects meet and live through its first crises. Cause having new features comes at a cost, and people eventually grow tired of costs they can't just throw money at.
menaerus 2y ago
I am a long-time vim user and haven't had time to watch neovim developments more closely. What would be the incentive to move to Neovim, e.g. what are its best-selling features that vim doesn't have? Genuine question.
- juanrgar 2y ago
  It's 'native' LSP for me. I have coc.nvim in Vim and it's great, but it depends on nodejs. Tree-sitter is another good one, although in my experience it might increase CPU usage noticeably.
  - menaerus 2y ago
    I usually only have LSP for a single language so coc is not of much use for me. Syntax highlighting rendering engine in vim OTOH could use some speed improvements. I see it drowning sometimes on larger files with sematic syntax highlighting.
- petepete 2y ago
  For me it's Tree-sitter support. It builds a syntax tree for your files incredibly fast and allows the editor to use it for various things, including much better syntax highlighting. https://tree-sitter.github.io/tree-sitter/ https://tree-sitter.github.io/tree-sitter/

3eb7988a1663 2y ago

I do not believe that is possible without compromising the goals of one of the two projects. Vim is expected to continue to work everywhere, even on some bank's circa 1980 mainframe. NeoVIM has become an effort to revitalize the project. Support for ancient systems was tossed almost immediately (eg no more 8.3 filename support code). NeoVIM also included some much improved default configuration values.

dleeftink 2y ago
> even on some bank's circa 1980 mainframe Continuity I get, but how much are we collectively burdened by having a few ancient uses determine the wants of the many?
- Out_of_Characte 2y ago
  Our window of compatibility only seems to grow larger over time. Old systems mostly get replaced when they lose function or the replacement becomes cheaper. But the replacement usually expects to last slightly longer than what its replacing. We've seen this slowly creep up in home computers, phones and even servers. I would argue that this is a function of small incremental improvements in everything from hard drives to computing. Lots of designs from the past can no longer connect to the internet in a meaningfull capacity but new hardware today might meaningfully last far longer than the developers could even anticipate.
- kstrauser 2y ago
  I wonder about that, too. Not that anyone's beating my door down to port my own projects to zOS or anything, but I consider modern Linux/BSD to be my baseline target for all new code I write. If it runs well on amd64/aarch64 Linux, Mac, and {Free,Open}BSD, that's enough. Well, and Windows, if someone makes it run there and it's not onerous to support. I wouldn't accept patches that make it harder to build or maintain on those primary systems. It's not that I actively hate anything that isn't a recent 64-bit Unix, but that the people on other systems are either 1) hobbyists who are competent to port stuff to their own systems, or 2) companies who aren't paying me for extraordinary support. Bummer if something I wrote last week doesn't run on HP-UX, but it's not going to cost me sleep.

umbs 2y ago

"... vim and neovim merge,..." This seems very unlikely. In neovim help docs there's a paragraph in file `nvim.txt` Nvim is emphatically a fork of Vim, not a clone: compatibility with Vim (especially editor and Vimscript features) is maintained where possible. See |vim differences| for the complete reference of differencesfrom Vim. nvim maintainers believe the project diverged and compatibility is best effort at this stage. Essentially, there's no plan to merge the two projects at this stage and the benefits are not evident.

glaucon 2y ago

> Though I really hope vim and neovim merge I hope that if they do merge that the connection to ICCF Holland is maintained. Every time you start vim (without specifying a file) you see the message "Help poor children in Uganda!". It's been a salutary thing over the years to see Bram building something as amazing as vim and maintaining the commitment to helping orphaned kids in Uganda, I would be sad if that disappeared under the neovim bus. If you're a vim user and you'd like to support Bram's vision, here's the link https://iccf-holland.org/donate.html https://iccf-holland.org/donate.html .