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vscodium, vscode without spyware
(github.com)
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this post was submitted on 05 Aug 2023
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Alternatively you can use and support a true community-driven editing environment dedicated to preserving your freedom, like vim/neovim or emacs.
But that's something new to learn and configure. I just want to code why should I spend my time learning another text editor when vscodium is fine
Careful. You're in a linux-heavy audience. They're the kinda people who would spend a few weeks setting up systems to use it for a few minutes.
That's simply outrageous!!! As soon as I finish tinkering with my system, I'll prepare a proper reply...
On a more serious note though. Don't overlook the role of procrastination in the endless tinkering many put on their boxes. I'm speaking from experience.
Who uses a system for only few minutes?
Well, it's because after using the system for only a few minutes, I realise it's not quite right, and I'll have to spend a few weeks to set it up again!
I'm a full-time Vim and Linux user when writing code. I agree with the statement that "simply switching" editors is very naive. I'm my personal opinion, you should decide on an editor that makes sense to you and learn to be very good at it. If VS Code is that answer, then great. Not everything points to Vim or Emacs.
Who doesn't want to go through learning of text editor and pain of configuring instead of actually coding?
Well...obviously them.
That's fine too. Use whatever does the job for you, but give alternatives a try if you ever have the time.
Vim and EMACS require tons of plugins and a brain transplant to feel confortable using them.
And the new personality tends to be somewhat evangelical about the editors ๐
New, since the 80s
I meant the new implanted personality. Not historically new.
I'm still using sublime to this day. It keeps getting worse and falling behind VSCode with every new feature that never comes gets to it, but I have so many pet peeves with VSCode that everytime I try it I soon give up. I wish there were more options these days, but as the expected feature sets get more complex the number of options keep going down.
But isn't atom and vscodium almost the same stuff?
I was under the impression that was a fork of atom
No, but there is a fork of atom being developed called Pulsar.
https://pulsar-edit.dev/
Well, if you learned emacs, you could do everything in it and won't have to change ever again! /s kinda
Same reason why a carpenter should learn to properly use hand tools, or a teacher should keep up on literature. In other words, master your tools. It doesn't matter which tool you use, provided you can use it to its full potential.
I occasionally use VSCode, but I mostly use ViM because that's my tool of choice.
For another reason, if your ever in the situation where you need to work on something on a remote server or an unfamiliar machine, knowing ViM means you can at least be somewhat productive when you don't have your normal tools available.
I know vim. I'm using vscodium with a vim plugin. I was coding in pure vim for half a year because my Laptop with 4 gigs of RAM couldn't handle vscode. I just don't want to configure vim so it does all the stuff VScodium does for me
That's fine, use what works best. I think there's value in getting at least the basics working, such as syntax highlighting and linting in case you want or need to use it again.
The question was why one should learn to use something like ViM or emacs, not why anything else is a poor option. Master your tools, regardless of what they are.
I would love to use emacs, unfortunately coding in TypeScript is much more pleasant to me than coding in elisp or lua.
Not to say Typescript is a good experience either, I always feel like fighting the language than actually coding. Just saying they are better than elisp or lua.
Also I find vscode has better mouse interaction, but maybe emacs got better with time.
Are you talking about configuring the editor? Ideally, that's not a common task, so it really shouldn't matter much if it uses TypeScript, elisp, vimscript, or lua.
And if you're primarily using the mouse, you're missing most of the point of editors, especially emacs and ViM. The real power of those editors comes from keyboard shortcuts and combos, not from plugins and menus.
Yes, ideally a editor would work without any configuration, but unfortunately I haven't met any emacs user with sub 200 line dot files.
I personally cannot remember more than 20 hotkeys to save my life.
Also I find the most time-consuming part of my work is actually thinking, not clicking around with a mouse. so I don't really need to spend month to remember all the hotkey just to save 2 seconds clicking. In fact, slow down and click couple buttons to commit gives me a bit to rest and enjoy the moment when I have finished a task...
It's not about optimizing code entry, but optimizing reading code, since you read code a lot more than you write it.
I'm not super familiar with emacs, I'm a vim person, but here are a few examples of mouse vs keyboard navigation.
Search for text in a file:
Mouse:
Shortcut:
Vim:
*on the word you wantnfor next,Nfor previousFind matching brace/bracket/parenthesis:
Mouse:
Shortcut: not sure
Vim:
%Navigate to the top/bottom of the file:
Mouse: scroll or click the sidebar
Shortcut: not sure
Vim:
ggfor the top of file,Gfor the bottomGo to a specific line:
I.e. If from output from a script, like a test failure.
Mouse: scroll or if you have a plugin, click on the red part (i.e. test or lint failure)
Shortcut: in VSCode, Ctrl + click on file name
Vim: G or
:<number>And so on. Vim is optimized for code navigation, a mouse is optimized for intuitive navigation (but slower), and shortcuts kinda fill in the gaps.
If you just want to get up and running quickly, something like VSCode is a good option. That's what I did when I decided to help my team out with some FE TypeScript code, when I normally use something else. I actually installed a vim plugin for VSCode to get the best of both worlds.
But if you really want a fluid code navigation and editing experience, master something like ViM or emacs.
Oh, and I didn't mention one of the most powerful things in both ViM end emacs: macros. I use them a ton when manipulating text, such as converting JSON to a class/struct, or doing repetitive syntax changes that are just out of reach of a regex.
Proper VS Code shortcuts for the above cases...
Find next: Ctrl-f, F4
Find matching brace: Ctrl-]
Navigate to Top or Bottom: Ctrl-Home Ctrl-End
I think it's the same number of keys pressed as vim in every case.
Probably, and we could go back and forth based on features. My main point was that using the keyboard is generally more efficient than using the mouse, especially since my hand is already there.
So for software you use every day, master it. Master the keyboard shortcuts, learn how to customize things, etc. Maybe VSCode has an option for macros, IDK (I've used them with the ViM mode, so that's at least one option). Using the mouse should be a fallback, not the first option.
You raise a valid point. Personally, I used to read and write a lot of code, but I no longer do that. I still maintain a open source project, but my job no longer involves writing code that runs.
IIRC, the most useful functionality I used to use are:
I am quite curious on why go to beginning or end of the file useful? Also I am not sure that the basic find/replace is more useful than find usage/refactor.
Plugins are available for most popular languages. I rarely need to see the type of a value, and if I want to see the signature of a function, I usually want to go to the implementation as well.
I just use
grep. I'm already in a terminal, so I have all of those features available. Since I use tmux, I just switch over to another pane and run my search there. For changing the name of a function (which is very rare), I just usesedor do the change manually withvim $(grep ...)if it's more than just a name change (usually I'm changing the signature too).I use a plugin for that, and it works really well.
Beginning of file: look for an import/constant
End of file: add new function, or a shortcut to the last brace to jump to the start of the class/function. I try to keep files small and single-purpose, so it's usually what I want (jump to end and match braces).
And yeah, I occasionally miss context-aware search/refactor, but again, it's so rare that it's not a big deal. I save far more time with macros than I lose doing manual renames. If I know I'll be doing a lot of that (and usually it comes in bursts), I have VSCode installed as well. But I don't launch it very often.
My whole workflow is very command-line oriented, so using a GUI tool just gets in the way for me.
That is valid man, we all have different workflow, hence different priorities.
Yup, use what works. Most of my coworkers use VSCode, and I'm the oddball with ViM (though I have VSCode installed w/ ViM extension).
Whatever you use, master it. I recommend learning some CLI editor in case you end up needing one.
That is great advice. Vim was actually the first editor I properly learned. I find many of the keybinding very nice and useful especially for cursor movement.
I eventually moved away from it since I find I spend more time learning it than using it. I personally dont use that many feature of a editor, I find IDE features more important to me.
But I still have many global keybinding inspired by vim, like ctrl + jkhl;^ for cursor movement. They are absolutely essential for me at this point.
Hjkl is the one core ViM feature that I actually rarely use. I use Dvorak keyboard layout, so those keys are in an awkward location, so I use other movements instead.
I have just enough IDE features in ViM that I don't feel the need to switch for most tasks, and if I ever did, there are plugins that fill in the gaps.
So I guess we're just opposite sides of the same coin. :)
lapce is a vscode replacement that has all the sugar that people love and it's blazingly fast. It's still in alpha but I'm very hopeful for it's future.
I have looked at lapce and I am hopeful it will mature enough to replace vscode. I haven't had the time to see if it works enough to replace vscode for my daily work, but I am planning on trying it again soon.
Fleet seems promising but not sure how I feel about another JetBrains editor.
Glad you liked it :) It still has issues but the development is happening at breakneck pace. I'm planning on daily driving it once it goes beta.
I also have conflicting feelings about jetbrains IDEs. Does fleet have a community edition? I use pycharm sometimes but also hate it sometimes.
Right now fleet is basically a community edition. They had stated there will be a paid version. So I am wondering how many features will be locked behind a paywall. Hopefully they have all the features from the beta available and just add some enterprise features to the paid version.
I really miss atom, would have been great if MS didn't kill that project. It would be interesting to see how it would have compared to code.
Hopefully it'll stay that way. Otherwise there is EAP I suppose. That's what I do with webstorm.
For me it's Sublime text. It's blazingly fast and robust, but because it isn't as popular as code and not open, there aren't as many plugins. I honestly think that if it had been opensource, it would have captured the market share that vscose holds now.
Emacs isn't super great for C#. The language server is a bit hit and miss.
Am I going to be judged for admitting I use KDE Kate on here?
Kate is outstanding
Are there extensions for Kate as there are for VS Codium?
Not remotely as many, but yes. I find that for the work I do It's more than adequate.
Nah Kate is fine if it works for you :)
Personally though, I use Kate. Ain't got time to learn new keybindings
That is incorrect. Both are pretty barebones from the start and have a big pool of extensions to get the functionality that you need. It might be more involved on the vim/nvim side, but that is more of an accessibility VS personalization thing.
There are even sort of distributions for nvim that bring you all the common functionalities already configured.