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> "But when I open Sublime Text and type "ctrl-p" to go to another file, it just works plain better than any vim plugin can achieve." You are not talking about

> "But when I open Sublime Text and type "ctrl-p" to go to another file, it just works plain better than any vim plugin can achieve." You are not talking about the same ST2 I've tried out. Mine was limited to files contained in "the project" (so none, if you just open a single file, not even nearby files) and the only way to open a a file outside of "the project" was to use the classic Ctrl+o. How "modern" that was! > "Now, these aren't just "I want my editor to be pretty" issues. A lot of these things are functionally important to get working faster on your code." But, somehow, all the issues in your list have something to do with looks and that's one of the most subjective subjects possible. RoundRects don't help anyone write better code faster: they help you feel better and more confident but nothing more. I'm actually a fan of minimalism and text-based interface and the "fixes" you want would be of no interest to me. > "- Making pop-up boxes, a-la Sublime Text, that moves you to a new file. Simply cannot be implemented in a nice-looking way in vim." I'd say that LustyExplorer looked quite good and now CtrlP both looks very good and does a lot more than ST2's Ctrl+P window. > "- Making some fonts smaller or bigger, to display extra information that isn't code. Simply impossible to do, because vim is a one-size font. This alone is a huge limitation." I fail to see how such a feature would make Vim or any editor better. > "- Making a decent-looking code-folding system. The code folding in vim doesn't look good, and since you're limited to one font size and to only putting in characters, you're stuck with the very ugly way of doing things. I'm a huge fan of vim folding, and the way of controlling them is just amazing. Except for the way it looks, which is terrible." Subjectivity again. How it looks is totally irrelevant: how it works is what matters. `za`, `zM`, `zR`, `zj` and friends are the important parts: add a nice gradient, a right-pointing shadowed arrow and rounded corners and you simply have the exact same feature… with a shiny look that suits your taste. Maybe not mine.

edanm 14y ago
You wrote a large reply, so I feel I owe you a good response. Honestly, I feel it's kind of, let's say, interesting, that I have to defend things like "maybe we'd like more than one font size". Maybe it's worth the sacrifice for having vim retain the same look-and-feel in the terminal, but to outright think that variable font sizes are inherently useless in a software program? Whose primary purpose is to edit text, no less? Still, here are some examples of more functional ways vim could be better. Most of these are related to visuals, yes, because that's the main thing that plugins can't change in vim. Examples: 1. Code folding is there to make it easier to scan code. Vim's folds take up a lot of space, and aren't very easy to scan. Yes, this is subjective - it's possible that for you, it's the easiest to scan thing in the world. But for me, the way many modern editors work is better - have a simple, colored, "..." indicator at the end of the line that has a fold after it. Simple, easy to scan, doesn't take up any more lines on screen. Minimal, in the sense of UI. 2. Adding some kind of info in the margin. Most editors add some kind of way to see folds in the margin. This is usually kept very tight, since all you really need are some dashed-lines and a "+" sign, perhaps. Not possible with vim. The closest we have is "foldcolumn", which a) takes up a lot of space, and b) is less visually appearling, making it harder to understand or use. Other info is also sometimes added, not just folds. 3. The project opening. While I love ctrl-p, especially over the alternatives, it has several flaws. For example, it's very, noticeably, slow. And I'm on small projects, usually. But here's the bigger issue: the way ctrl-p in Sublime works is more beautiful, but that's not the only advantage. It makes it easier to see what file you're going to open. It makes it easier by doing things like bold-ing the letters that it's matched. It makes it easier by making the filenames "REALLY BIG", but still giving you the details of the file's location in a smaller font. There are really many more issues I can bring up, but these are the keys. In all honesty, vim is a bad choice for most people because, to get it to the level of what Sublime Text or other editors do out of the box, you have to spend months tweaking vim. This makes it irrelevant for the vast, vast majority of people, which is unfortunate, because it has text-editing capabilites that are simply unsurpassed by any other editor.
- johncoltrane 14y ago
  Let's go for another long comment. 1. I've seen that "…". I think it's an horrible UI as it is always at different horizontal positions forcing me to move my eyes a lot more than necessary. That symbol is also almost completely devoid of information: the number of folded lines and a sample are often useful and I can't get that with "…". Except if I take my mouse and hover on that "…" to preview my 50 or 100 folded lines cramped in a huge ass popin. Contrast that with a regular fold in Vim: http://i.imgur.com/WXg1p.png http://i.imgur.com/WXg1p.png * it is easy to find * it is easy to parse * it shows the number of hidden lines * it takes only one line * its purpose is obvious 2. Vim as signs for errors and fold indicators, there are plugins that show marks, too. A "fold" sign in the gutter is mainly useful if it's hard to notice the fold in the editor space. Because it's hard to spot "…" folds you scan the gutter to locate folds. Because it's hard to miss a fold in vim, such an indicator is not needed. But Vim's foldcolumn not only shows the location of a fold: it provides an additional information that no right pointing triangle or boxed plus sign can show: the depth of the fold. Anyway, if you only care about seeing folds in the gutter, well… that's covered too by the simple fact that the whole line is highligted. 3. I also work on small projects (under 50/60 files without assets) and everything in CtrlP is instantaneous. We obviously have very different æsthetic preferences: I find everything in ST2 absolutely hideous. The font size tricks in ctrl+p you describe are both very arbitrary, simplistic and distracting. Vim's CtrlP shows the paths of the matched files, highlights the matched characters and systematically puts the default match at the bottom. There's nothing hard about it: simple, clear, fast… and, again, it has lots more features than its ST2 "counterpart". Not to forget Vim's native wildmenu which also shows the path and highlights your choice in a very readable manner. I don't agree with your last paragraph as well. I really really really don't care if or why people don't like Vim. I chose it over dozens of editors/IDE because it worked for me: not because it was fashionable, not because I mistook it for something else. I have no stake in this, I don't root for Vim, I don't want more users, I don't want less users, I just don't care if it's easier, harder or whatever. I'm perfectly fine with Vim in its current state and I'm persuaded it doesn't need any of those pseudo-refinements. Vim is the work of love of a bunch of talented programmers with an unbelievable ecosystem. It's free in every meaning of the world, it's old and a lot more powerful than any other editor, with the possible exception of Emacs. Its core developpers and, I believe, many users certainly prefer Vim as it is and don't care at all about making it easier for new users. More attention, more users… all of that is necessary for Panic, MacRabbit, Macromates or SublimeHQ because that's the only way they can survive. They desperately need differentiating "features" to attract new users or justify license upgrades and make more money: skeuomorphic UI, rounded rectangles, gradients, transitions, integration with this or that trendy language or framework and so on. None of that matters to Vim and its developers and lots of its users. ST2's author is probably happier each time a Vim user switches to ST2 but Bram Moolenaar most certainly doesn't give a flying fuck. That's very important and that has to be considered when talking about cosmetic "enhancements" or "fixes" to Vim.

edanm 14y ago

You wrote a large reply, so I feel I owe you a good response. Honestly, I feel it's kind of, let's say, interesting, that I have to defend things like "maybe we'd like more than one font size". Maybe it's worth the sacrifice for having vim retain the same look-and-feel in the terminal, but to outright think that variable font sizes are inherently useless in a software program? Whose primary purpose is to edit text, no less? Still, here are some examples of more functional ways vim could be better. Most of these are related to visuals, yes, because that's the main thing that plugins can't change in vim. Examples: 1. Code folding is there to make it easier to scan code. Vim's folds take up a lot of space, and aren't very easy to scan. Yes, this is subjective - it's possible that for you, it's the easiest to scan thing in the world. But for me, the way many modern editors work is better - have a simple, colored, "..." indicator at the end of the line that has a fold after it. Simple, easy to scan, doesn't take up any more lines on screen. Minimal, in the sense of UI. 2. Adding some kind of info in the margin. Most editors add some kind of way to see folds in the margin. This is usually kept very tight, since all you really need are some dashed-lines and a "+" sign, perhaps. Not possible with vim. The closest we have is "foldcolumn", which a) takes up a lot of space, and b) is less visually appearling, making it harder to understand or use. Other info is also sometimes added, not just folds. 3. The project opening. While I love ctrl-p, especially over the alternatives, it has several flaws. For example, it's very, noticeably, slow. And I'm on small projects, usually. But here's the bigger issue: the way ctrl-p in Sublime works is more beautiful, but that's not the only advantage. It makes it easier to see what file you're going to open. It makes it easier by doing things like bold-ing the letters that it's matched. It makes it easier by making the filenames "REALLY BIG", but still giving you the details of the file's location in a smaller font. There are really many more issues I can bring up, but these are the keys. In all honesty, vim is a bad choice for most people because, to get it to the level of what Sublime Text or other editors do out of the box, you have to spend months tweaking vim. This makes it irrelevant for the vast, vast majority of people, which is unfortunate, because it has text-editing capabilites that are simply unsurpassed by any other editor.

johncoltrane 14y ago
Let's go for another long comment. 1. I've seen that "…". I think it's an horrible UI as it is always at different horizontal positions forcing me to move my eyes a lot more than necessary. That symbol is also almost completely devoid of information: the number of folded lines and a sample are often useful and I can't get that with "…". Except if I take my mouse and hover on that "…" to preview my 50 or 100 folded lines cramped in a huge ass popin. Contrast that with a regular fold in Vim: http://i.imgur.com/WXg1p.png http://i.imgur.com/WXg1p.png * it is easy to find * it is easy to parse * it shows the number of hidden lines * it takes only one line * its purpose is obvious 2. Vim as signs for errors and fold indicators, there are plugins that show marks, too. A "fold" sign in the gutter is mainly useful if it's hard to notice the fold in the editor space. Because it's hard to spot "…" folds you scan the gutter to locate folds. Because it's hard to miss a fold in vim, such an indicator is not needed. But Vim's foldcolumn not only shows the location of a fold: it provides an additional information that no right pointing triangle or boxed plus sign can show: the depth of the fold. Anyway, if you only care about seeing folds in the gutter, well… that's covered too by the simple fact that the whole line is highligted. 3. I also work on small projects (under 50/60 files without assets) and everything in CtrlP is instantaneous. We obviously have very different æsthetic preferences: I find everything in ST2 absolutely hideous. The font size tricks in ctrl+p you describe are both very arbitrary, simplistic and distracting. Vim's CtrlP shows the paths of the matched files, highlights the matched characters and systematically puts the default match at the bottom. There's nothing hard about it: simple, clear, fast… and, again, it has lots more features than its ST2 "counterpart". Not to forget Vim's native wildmenu which also shows the path and highlights your choice in a very readable manner. I don't agree with your last paragraph as well. I really really really don't care if or why people don't like Vim. I chose it over dozens of editors/IDE because it worked for me: not because it was fashionable, not because I mistook it for something else. I have no stake in this, I don't root for Vim, I don't want more users, I don't want less users, I just don't care if it's easier, harder or whatever. I'm perfectly fine with Vim in its current state and I'm persuaded it doesn't need any of those pseudo-refinements. Vim is the work of love of a bunch of talented programmers with an unbelievable ecosystem. It's free in every meaning of the world, it's old and a lot more powerful than any other editor, with the possible exception of Emacs. Its core developpers and, I believe, many users certainly prefer Vim as it is and don't care at all about making it easier for new users. More attention, more users… all of that is necessary for Panic, MacRabbit, Macromates or SublimeHQ because that's the only way they can survive. They desperately need differentiating "features" to attract new users or justify license upgrades and make more money: skeuomorphic UI, rounded rectangles, gradients, transitions, integration with this or that trendy language or framework and so on. None of that matters to Vim and its developers and lots of its users. ST2's author is probably happier each time a Vim user switches to ST2 but Bram Moolenaar most certainly doesn't give a flying fuck. That's very important and that has to be considered when talking about cosmetic "enhancements" or "fixes" to Vim.