From: David Vallner <david@...>
Date: 2006-08-27T19:36:27+09:00
Subject: Re: Why Ruby does not nead an ide

Chad Perrin wrote:
> Hardly.  EMACS is more than ten times the installed size of Vim.  I've
> also seen situations where a file was too big to open in EMACS, but Vim
> managed it just fine.  Also, of course, there's the simple fact that
> EMACS == Esc+Meta+Alt+Ctrl+Shift.

"I've seen situations..."

Dear lord in heavens, for the love of all that's good and holy, not this 
again.

But.

Installed size is so much not an argument if you have the iron to handle 
it. If you don't, it's still not an argument since the fact you have to 
work on Aunt Tilly's internet-enabled fridge to do your coding work 
doesn't make an editor "better". If program performance is a metric you 
consider honestly important, what the hell are you doing on a Ruby 
mailing list at all?

Just how often do you edit text files of insane sizes again? If and only 
if it were the bulk of your editing work, would it be a relevant reason 
to choose your primary editor as one that can open those files. Unless 
you work on Aunt Tilly's internet-enabled fridge where you can't fit two 
to use one as a backup for these cases.

And... To save and quit, vim is ESC : w g - five keypresses. With the 
shift key having to be held down too - if running in console mode, I 
doubt it's possible to detect standalone modifier keypresses. Emacs is 
C-x C-c Space Space (for one buffer) - siz keypresses. ZOMG 
FINGERSTRAIN! (Muah.)

<anal-retention>
With sticky modifier keys on, you don't even have to twist a pinky 
finger to hold down a modifier key for those combinations, ESC is 
horribly out of the way unless you remap your keyboard, and the space 
key being pressed repeatedly makes it faster since you don't need to 
reacquire a target. I'd even go as far as to say that the C-x C-s C-x 
C-c combo being not much worse a case for the multiple buffer case, 
since all the keys needed are close on the US QWERTY keyboard and you 
only need the left hand to type them. *groan*
</anal-retention>

It boils down to personal preference and nothing more. Vim is probably 
better for people that can estimate line numbers in their head, since 
you win most of the efficiency in being able to type the commands off 
the top of your head, Emacs for if you can hack elisp like there's no 
tomorrow (the vim scripting language is rather basic and would probably 
hit a complexity wall with some problems), or if you can work easier 
with integration of all the features as opposed to the vim way of 
hopping between console windows / screen wossnames / alien-machine 
interface pseudopods.

So... Cut out the editor trolling, neither side has real arguments 
anyway, just different needs that the editors satisfy in different measures.

For interested parties, I use neither side of that holy war. SciTE / 
gedit / kate depending on current operating system for simple things or 
in a pinch, nano / joe from a console for five-second config file 
touchup, Eclipse whenever I need a feature that's outside the scope of 
actually editing text and more the responsibility of a development tool. 
(3.2 working sets considered sexy.)

David Vallner