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Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - Printable Version
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Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - jkl - 05-01-2017

Last week, while accidentally witnessing one of those usual vi/Vim/Emacs/nano/ed discussions, I noticed that I probably have a weird setup: I do most of my actual development work with one editor while using another editor for configuration and similar short files. The advantage (to me) is that I prefer a comfortable, not necessarily small and fast environment for programming while editing configuration (etc.) files should just be quick.

As the majority of editor wars revolve around people preferring only one editor for just about anything, I'm curious if I'm having an unusual mindset or if we live in a two-editors world indeed.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - 0wl3x - 05-01-2017

I do the same. I use vim anytime I am in the console and have a config file to look at & edit. When I am writing code for a project I always use my version of emacs. It seems more practical to me to use something that's less fully featured but faster and lightweight when editing something I know I am only going to have open for a few seconds, /etc/hosts for example.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - venam - 05-01-2017

(05-01-2017, 11:43 AM)jkl Wrote: As the majority of editor wars revolve around people preferring only one editor for just about anything, I'm curious if I'm having an unusual mindset or if we live in a two-editors world indeed.
For almost everything I use vim.
But vim sucks at clipboard handling even with a wrapper/plugin.
Sometimes for copying big chunks of text I use another editor, geany.

Also, when it comes to certain languages, I prefer writing things directly in the place where they are going to be executed/tested.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - 0wl3x - 05-01-2017

(05-01-2017, 01:07 PM)venam Wrote: Sometimes for copying big chunks of text I use another editor, geany.

Venam, do you add any plugins to geany? Is it just regular from the GNU distribution?


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - venam - 05-01-2017

(05-01-2017, 03:44 PM)0wl3x Wrote: Venam, do you add any plugins to geany? Is it just regular from the GNU distribution?
Vanilla vim and vanilla whatever else.

Maybe just a colorscheme change and vimbling( https://github.com/ivyl/vim-bling/ ) for fanciness.
That way I stay comfortable even when editing files remotely, which is useful at work.

I wasn't even knowledgeable about the fact that geany had plugins.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - 0wl3x - 05-01-2017

(05-01-2017, 04:16 PM)venam Wrote: Vanilla vim and vanilla whatever else.

Okay cool. I use vanilla vim and a heavily modified version of emacs.
(05-01-2017, 04:16 PM)venam Wrote: I wasn't even knowledgeable about the fact that geany had plugins.
I don't know if geany has plugins either but then again I've never met a person who has used it for development!


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - acg - 05-01-2017

I personally use NeoVim for everything. Is the one I feel comfortable with and don't have any reason to switch from it, yet. Try to convince me tho.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - jkl - 05-01-2017

I saw that NeoVim, while having an interesting plug-in system (yay, Common Lisp!), features a couple of features which found their way back into the original Vim, including "jobs". But trying to convince someone of a different editor will probably lead to very unfriendly discussions, so no, I won't.

(Disclosure: I stopped using Vim.)


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - rocx - 05-01-2017

Emacs shoulders 99% of my text-editing needs and then some. "And then some" because I haven't written a line of code in a long time outside of prose, so ERC, Magit, pass, Calc, Woman, and a butt-ton of other front-ends see more light. When a few commands need to be tinkered and I can't be bothered to open a shell buffer, a terminal window cracks open and runs a few things. nvi does a few minor configuration changes.

SSHing? TRAMP, mate.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - pranomostro - 05-01-2017

I use sam (sam.cat-v.org) for serious text editing, and ed for commit messages and really short editing tasks in small files. Copy-paste in both of them is quite a pain, but I got used to it.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - hades - 05-01-2017

Favorite editor all the time, which of course, means vim...

v i m


I use a special web-based editor for github markdown but that's different I guess.

Oh, and I do use visudo in one specific use case, which I'm sure you can guess.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - apk - 06-01-2017

ever since i started using bsd i've returned to my one true love and the only piece of software worth using which just coincidentally happens to be a text editor (in all senses) and that piece of software is of course acme


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - josuah - 06-01-2017

People talking together of how they use Vim along with Emacs, or only one of them, or sam, or acme, or other, even open to gtk-based editors... Without flaming.

That is beautiful!

For now, I vim, I used to Emacs, I will nvi, vis, iode, edna, vi or neovim perhaps some day?

What I particularly like are programs that use "$EDITOR" and "$PAGER" rather than their own half baked editor.

There is mail(1), from which the convention is from iirc, but also dvtm(1) (5 153 lines of code) using $EDITOR to copy and $PAGER to scroll, unlike tmux (49 325 lines of code) which has both built-in. I can't blame tmux as it is still pretty neat.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - jkl - 06-01-2017

^ edna is sweet, I planned to write something like that from scratch because there is no native ed for Windows (only the GNU port). Yeah, time saved! Bookmarking, thanks.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - dab - 06-01-2017

Most of the time using vim, sometimes spacemacs. Trying to grokk vis :)


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - 0wl3x - 06-01-2017

@dab
Spacemacs is great. Have you been using evil mode? If yes, how do you like it?


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - Tmplt - 06-01-2017

I tend to use (neo)vim for everything. I'm far from efficient at it though: I have a lot of installed plugins I've yet to use and I only use hjkl, $, 0, G and gg for file navigation (once every blue moon I'll actually use { and } to move between paragraphs/code blocks).


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - dab - 06-01-2017

@0wl3x yes, choose it because of evil mode. Actulally I like integration of different emacs plugins like magit, helm and others with evil mode. But it's rare used lately, mostly vim with fzf and git integration.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - strang3quark - 06-01-2017

It depends, I use vim for almost everything but sometimes I need to work with Java (Android) and there's no point in using vim for that.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - josuah - 07-01-2017

strang3quark: I blame these programming language and programing environment that require something as heavy as eclipse to run.

This is the list of repositories required to build all eclipse features: https://git.eclipse.org/c/

The number of lines of the source of this page is twice what is needed to make a minimal text editor like kilo.

Wow! This editor has even more GitHub stars than lines of code!


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - pranomostro - 09-01-2017

(06-01-2017, 03:05 AM)apk Wrote: ever since i started using bsd i've returned to my one true love and the only piece of software worth using which just coincidentally happens to be a text editor (in all senses) and that piece of software is of course acme

Calling that wannabe window manager an editor is at least madness, maybe even lovecraftian horror. acmefs is pretty nice though.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - z3bra - 10-01-2017

vis has become my main editor for monthes now. It is simple and fast enough for things as simple as editing a 3 lines config file. The default config is sane enough as well, so no need to tiker with config files or keep track of them. I tend to use other editors as well, for different reasons:
  • vis - $EDITOR is set to it
  • vi - when vis is not available (so basically every remote machine I log into, be it mine or for work)
  • ed - for low-spec/really old machines, and when editing file remotely from my phone
  • redirections/heredoc - for when I just need to dump some content as-is into a file
  • leafpad - for times when using a mouse is easier
  • notepad++ - don't judge me too fast.



RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - josuah - 10-01-2017

(10-01-2017, 08:53 AM)z3bra Wrote:
  • notepad++


Sometimes, people have to code on MS Windows at work. Sometimes they use Visual Studio. Sometimes, they use notepad++.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - jkl - 10-01-2017

I use Emacs for coding on MS Windows at work.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - z3bra - 10-01-2017

(10-01-2017, 12:55 PM)josuah Wrote: Sometimes, people have to code on MS Windows at work. Sometimes they use Visual Studio. Sometimes, they use notepad++.

My work machine is a windows machine. notepad++ is the simplest editor I've found on windows for my needs. Be it for reviewing SQL statements, viewing logs or whatever. If I need to "code" anything, I do that on my virtual machine.
I tried vim for windows, but it simply doesn't cut it.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - hades - 10-01-2017

(10-01-2017, 01:51 PM)z3bra Wrote:
(10-01-2017, 12:55 PM)josuah Wrote: Sometimes, people have to code on MS Windows at work. Sometimes they use Visual Studio. Sometimes, they use notepad++.

My work machine is a windows machine. notepad++ is the simplest editor I've found on windows for my needs. Be it for reviewing SQL statements, viewing logs or whatever. If I need to "code" anything, I do that on my virtual machine.
I tried vim for windows, but it simply doesn't cut it.

You should check out Atom by the folks at github, it's breddy gud

You could also check out Lime, a FOSS clone of Sublime Text. I've played around with it and really like it, but haven't used it on Windows


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - z3bra - 11-01-2017

(10-01-2017, 09:42 PM)hades Wrote:
(10-01-2017, 01:51 PM)z3bra Wrote:
(10-01-2017, 12:55 PM)josuah Wrote: Sometimes, people have to code on MS Windows at work. Sometimes they use Visual Studio. Sometimes, they use notepad++.

My work machine is a windows machine. notepad++ is the simplest editor I've found on windows for my needs. Be it for reviewing SQL statements, viewing logs or whatever. If I need to "code" anything, I do that on my virtual machine.
I tried vim for windows, but it simply doesn't cut it.

You should check out Atom by the folks at github, it's breddy gud

You could also check out Lime, a FOSS clone of Sublime Text. I've played around with it and really like it, but haven't used it on Windows

Honestly, I would even use the plain notepad if it was not fucking up with unix line feeds... I'm really not akeen to learn a new "featurful" editor to use it as a simple note taker.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - mrtn - 11-01-2017

I'm not sure what to make of atom. In general, it's an okay-ish editor. But it takes so fucking long to startup on my work-pc... That alone is the reason, I'm sticking with Notepad++ for quick note-taking and small edits in config files... For programming I'm sticking mostly to IntelliJ (or Eclipse at work, because we have to...)


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - Wildefyr - 12-01-2017

(05-01-2017, 01:07 PM)venam Wrote: For almost everything I use vim.
But vim sucks at clipboard handling even with a wrapper/plugin.
Sometimes for copying big chunks of text I use another editor, geany.

curious, i've always felt vim's register approach using "* and "+ was more than enough for copying from system clipboards. so much so that i dislike having to install xclip for neovim for the same functionality.


RE: Using different editors for configuration and actual development... - venam - 12-01-2017

(12-01-2017, 09:26 AM)Wildefyr Wrote: curious, i've always felt vim's register approach using "* and "+ was more than enough for copying from system clipboards. so much so that i dislike having to install xclip for neovim for the same functionality.
I meant back and forth from vim to whatever else and from whatever else to vim.