Regex solves any mass-operations
No it doesn’t not after you’ve used LSP-enabled identifier renaming. But that’s the thing: Emacs, vim, helix, all have LSP integration, they’re actual code editors they aren’t lacking any feature that you’d expect from an IDE.
I can write regex to replace variable names in a matter of seconds despite not needing to do it very often, but I can also use regex to turn a list of data exported to csv into SQL. Or take a list of variable names and turn them into method stubs (or even full methods if they are small and consistent enough).
I don’t even need to think about LSP-enabled identifier renaming. It would be handy if I find myself having to use Vim - I’m not denigrating Vim. Those features are all great if it’s your IDE. But for example I had to look up what that even means because it’s nothing I need to know in any other IDE. And that’s really my point.
Vim has tons of power. The thing it’s really lacking is discoverability. You have to know how to do everything before you can do it. Meanwhile in IntelliJ or VSCode I just find the menu and if I want to be super quick, next to the menu item is the keyboard shortcut which makes it super easy to learn how to do a thing faster while still being able to do the thing. But with vim I have to change to a completely different context and open a browser and Google how to do a thing.
That’s the only problem I have with vim - it takes a huge and consistent investment to get as fast with it as I am with any other IDE out of the gate. Maybe I could eventually even get faster, but could I ever recoup that time investment? It doesn’t seem like it to me since my tools are so rarely the thing slowing me down.
Again, I’ve no doubt vim is great once you learn it thoroughly. Nothing against vim or those who use it. Should the need arise, I’ll put in the effort. But until then I’m just using it for tweaking config files and bash scripts.
I can write regex to replace variable names in a matter of seconds despite not needing to do it very often
You can write a regex to replace a string in a matter of seconds. And so can I. What neither of us can do is write it such that the replacement is limited to the identifier we want to rename (because pumping lemma), that needs syntax if not semantics-aware editing and that’s exactly what LSP is for.
You’re using a screwdriver as a hammer. Does it work, sure, is it advisable? Even if you don’t have a hammer it might be easier and quicker to drive to the hardware store and buy one, depending on the particular nail you’re dealing with.
Meanwhile in IntelliJ or VSCode I just find the menu and if I want to be super quick, next to the menu item is the keyboard shortcut
Helix: <space>? opens function search, enter “rename”, “rename symbol” will be the first hit and it’ll also tell you that it’s bound to <space>r.
Blender: F3 instead of <space>r. Get out of here with clicking through menus. I have no idea where to find recalculate normals in the menus and I don’t care. “face” in edit mode, probably. Nope, just checked: Edit mode, mesh->normals->recalculate [inside, outside]. Kinda makes sense while normals are a property of faces you can’t calculate them without reference to a mesh as you wouldn’t be able to tell outside from inside, only stuff like “face camera”.
This isn’t so much about gui or not gui thing, both IntelliJ and VSCode come from the windows school of GUI design which says “discoverable without a manual, hotkeys are available for power users”. Blender, OTOH, follows the UNIX philosophy of “RTFM, start working like a pro from the beginning it’s worth it, the interface is just a suggestion, adjust it to your workflow”.
Maybe I could eventually even get faster, but could I ever recoup that time investment?
How would you know without giving them an honest spin? Personally I wouldn’t recommend vim, btw, lots of hysterical raisins and inconsistencies to be found there and configuration is a PITA which wouldn’t even be that bad if the out of the box experience was good. Helix cleans up both the command language and the whole configuration shebang (just make sure that LSP servers are installed and you’re good to go) while definitely sticking to the vi/blender style of interface design.
First I want to say this is a great comment overall. I appreciate it. But a couple notes:
What neither of us can do is write it such that the replacement is limited to the identifier we want to rename
\Widentifier\W - harder to navigate markdown than write the pattern. This would also catch references to the identifier in comments as well, though if the identifier isn’t a unique word it might take a little repair, but that’s rarely the case in Java where the convention is expressive identifiers.
UNIX philosophy of "RTFM, start working like a pro from the beginning […]
That only works for small manuals. Take Git for example, because that’s something I often use the CLI for. There are a huge number of things to learn out of the gate and you can’t just RTFM and you’re good to go. And it’s really not particularly big or complex. Something as simple as cherrypicking - well first I need to log to see the commit ids. Oh not just log but --pretty-something so I can just see the commit ids. Off to Google shit to remind me how to do another thing I only do every few weeks. Compare that to a GUI where I can just right-click cherry-pick. This absolutely kills my productivity because I do so much different shit, I can’t possibly remember everything that I barely use.
How would you know without giving them an honest spin?
I only have so many hours in the day to experiment. And I do, but the “cost” here is pretty high and the opportunity for return is low. We’re talking about things I might do a couple of times a month.
Now it’s possible I’m an idiot and I’m just slower or dumber than folks who like vim. It’s also possible my roles have been really fucked up and I don’t get to focus enough to get good at stuff that ought to be its own niche. All I can say is I’ve stuck my toe into the water and it’s fucking cold. Currently I’m probably 85% GUI and 15% CLI and other keyboard-centric tools. I just use whichever is the most expedient.
I wrote a one line bash script to start my vpn because I couldn’t remember each little keystroke but I can remember start-vpn.
Once again, I appreciate your comment. Upvoted. I don’t know what helix is. Blender I know but isn’t really a business software writing tool so I have maybe 20 hours playing around with it total. I’ll look into LSP on my PC, but I might just forget I have it by the time I try to figure out what to do with it.
