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Confession: I'm a Vim user

Alex Smith on March 12, 2020

I have a confession to make...I'm one of those people - an avid Vim user. I do my absolute best to not reveal that fact. It can be a polarizing sub...
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John Colagioia (he/him)

The key thing I learned when I was starting out was that, if you can reach a computer without sitting down in front of it, it probably has vi ready to go. I generally use a graphical editor locally--either an IDE or whatever the default text editor is, depending on what I'm working on--and vi or vim (hopefully the former is an alias for the latter) remotely so that I don't need to deal with getting a GUI running or for anything local that requires fussing around with the "weird" characters, like control characters and other non-printables.

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Larry Scott

Vim is definitely my first love, but I have to admit that I spend time between Vim and VS Code.

What makes Vim so appealing to me is that it’s lightweight - meaning it doesn’t take a great deal of time to open like an IDE would. I prefer to keep everything in the terminal if I can or one app if I can like VS Code does.

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Alex Smith

Do you use a lot of Vim plugins to behave more like VS code?

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Larry Scott

Not really tbh. I like a more stripped down Vim here in my later years of coding. I used to use Janus and on some machines I still have Janus installed.

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Calix Huang

I've heard memes and clout around using Vim, but I never got into it. I've seen people use it, but I personally don't think I'd like it just because I switch files frequently and like to see my file directory at all times. Plus, correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think Vim has auto-complete.

I'm not bashing Vim, I just was too lazy and busy to ever try it or learn using it. But, I'm open to change if people can convince me.

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Alex Smith

I enjoy the memes 😂.

Plugins can definitely assist. What I use is:

These days it can be difficult to make a super-strong case to say someone needs to learn Vim. My 2 cents are if you're even just a little curious about it, turn on Vim mode in any editor of your choice and see how it feels for a ~week.

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Calix Huang

I may try that 😂 Thanks for the advice!

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Demian Brecht

Vim has plugins for autocomplete. There are also plugins that will display directory structures.

It's not for everyone but you may find yourself leaning towards it and learning it eventually should your career take you down that road.

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Demian Brecht

dev.to/demianbrecht/you-will-pry-v... is the proof of my shared love ;)

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Alex Smith

Love it 😆

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Calix Huang

How long does the configuration of Vim take? I've never used it or attempted to use it, and never even knew it would even take time to be configured until I looked at your post.

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Demian Brecht

As little or as much time as you want. Your don't have to spend any time on it at all if you're happy with vim out of the box. Most aren't. OTOH if you want all the bells and whistles and keep up with the latest trends and plugins, it could be a continuous journey with no end in sight. It's all up to what you want to do with it.

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Alex Smith • Edited

I'll second what Demian said - it takes as long as you want. A lot of the Vim users I know personally use a distribution of Vim called Janus which comes with most of the popular plugins pre-installed (including most, if not all, of the ones I set up individually above). It's a quick and easy way to get started!

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rhymes • Edited

I don't know it much.

I spent years programming with Emacs which felt natural to me so I think I understand you!

I support your choice!

Go Alex!

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M Bellucci

Thanks for sharing this.
How do you switch to browser and use it without using the keyboard??

That’s something I’ve been struggling with