

Seven habits of effective text editing - lamnk
http://www.moolenaar.net/habits.html

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JunkDNA
This is solid advice. I recently returned to vim after using TextMate for a
while. The strategy of noticing when you are doing something that might
benefit from automation (vs trying to learn every single command) is a good
one. It takes a long time to master an editor like vim.

The only thing I haven't been able to get my head around is workin with lots
of files in a Django or Rails project. Nerdtree just is not as usable as the
TextMate project drawer. This is especially true for a web framework where you
hop from js to HTML to Python and back.

~~~
njharman
I rarely hop between those because I have 3-4 shell windows open (non
overlapping, across two fairly large screens)

    
    
      - vim to edit python
      - vim to edit template/html
      - shell to run dev server / unit tests / svn commands / etc
      - either a browser window or another vim editing unit tests
    

I find this setup so much more enjoyable and productive than IDE or opening
multiple files in one vim

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gjm11
Might be worth noting in the title that this is from 2000.

TL;DR version: The habits are for _users_ of text editors, not for the editors
themselves. They are: 1. move around quickly, 2. don't type things twice, 3.
fix errors quickly, 4. work effectively with groups of files, 5. provide easy
use of tools outside the text editor, 6. understand and work with the
structure of your text, 7. make a habit of improving your use of your text
editor.

Unsurprisingly, Moolenaar (author of Vim) uses Vim for his examples, but I
don't think this is primarily a propaganda exercise. Most of what he says
could be applied to, say, emacs with only superficial changes.

~~~
1amzave
> _Unsurprisingly, Moolenaar (author of Vim) uses Vim for his examples, but I
> don't think this is primarily a propaganda exercise. Most of what he says
> could be applied to, say, emacs with only superficial changes._

Mostly true, though there was (what seemed to me to be) a somewhat thinly-
veiled jab at emacs at the start of Habit 5...

~~~
rabidgnat
You could take the beginning of habit 5 as complementary to Emacs. Has another
program ever been extended to do more?

Towards the end of point 5, Bram really points out the strength of Vim over
Emacs - it is small enough that it could be refactored to be embeddable.
_This_ is the real slight towards Emacs - Emacs will never be embeddable, not
in a hundred years. It is the all-purpose consumer that provides little
benefit to outside programs. I think Bram saw a niche in creating a 'libvim'
that other programs could use

~~~
pook
Take a look at ezbl.

Emacs doesn't even attempt to become embeddable. It instead takes the strategy
of assimilating everything into a unified, tweakable UI.

Two completely different strategies, both useful in their own niches, and
incredibly powerful for those who have mastered their esoteric incantations.

That being said, resistance is futile.

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slmbrhrt
After reading this, I tried to :q that tab.

Had I been using the Vimperator plugin, this would have done something, I
know. Maybe it's worth installing again after all. Old habits and all that.

