
Atom 1.8 and 1.9 beta - one-more-minute
http://blog.atom.io/2016/06/06/atom-1-8-and-1-9-beta.html
======
kbd
Every time Atom is discussed, it's pointed out how slow it is, and then others
point out how VS Code is much faster yet is also based on Electron. Could
someone explain what makes VS Code significantly faster?

Full disclosure: Every time I try Atom I decide to stick with Sublime Text,
largely because Atom feels slow. I've never tried VS Code myself.

~~~
jongalloway2
Why haven't you tried VS Code? Relatively small download, fast install, free
and open source. You could install it in just a little more time than it takes
to post this question.
[https://code.visualstudio.com/](https://code.visualstudio.com/)

Disclaimer: I work for m-dollar. My commission rate is 0.0% and VS Code is
free, so I am hoping to make it up in volume.

~~~
lewisl9029
I love VS Code and have been using it as my main editor for quite a while now,
but the lack of project-wide find and _replace_ is why I still keep Atom
around:

[https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/issues/1690](https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/issues/1690)

This glaring omission combined with the proposed performance improvements in
the Atom 1.9 beta might just be enough to tempt me back to the Atom side
again.

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obilgic
I never understood why everyone complains about atom's speed on HN. I have
been using it for 3 years as my default editor with lots of plugins, never
experienced performance issues.

~~~
azeirah
The people with complaints about performance issues are the people coming from
Sublime Text.

Everything you do in Sublime is done _instantly_. Try opening the command
panel (ctrl+shift+p) both in sublime and atom. At least a 300ms difference.
Multiple cursors, switching to different panels (I can see the whole pane
getting rendered in front of my eyes -- not instant!), even things like
loading the list of installable plugins or installing a plugin is _far,
__far___ faster in sublime, assuming package control, compared to Atom!

Sublime also has this insane feature where no matter how many plugins you have
installed, Sublime will still start up in about 200-300 milliseconds, as fast
as notepad on Windows and faster than gedit on linux. Atom only goes slower
and slower and slower the more plugins you install.

When you're used to an editor that does everything instantly, everything that
takes longer than 200ms takes too long.

~~~
seanwilson
> Try opening the command panel (ctrl+shift+p) both in sublime and atom. At
> least a 300ms difference.

Opens instantly in Atom for me.

~~~
spriggan3
Try Open 10 files in Atom then open the File Panel. Try the same in Sublime
Text. There is a noticeable speed difference.

~~~
yAnonymous
* while standing on your hands upside down and drinking a glass of water

You will notice the difference!!11

------
gtallen1187
A big thank you to
[https://github.com/joefitzgerald](https://github.com/joefitzgerald) for the
environment handling!

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bhouston
I stopped using atom last week. It crashed too many times on me even though I
like it's feature set. Went back to trusty old sublime, Atom is crash-prone
and slow.

Maybe it is because of the extensions I installed but they were all popular.
If so then Atom should track crashes and correlate with extensions or
something like that.

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cryptos
I tried to like Atom two or three times, but it was simply too slow and too
buggy. Visual Studio Code is much faster and I haven't encountered severe bugs
so far.

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_RPM
atom has become my default GUI editor.

~~~
pp19dd
I share with others and recognize all the problems with atom. It's so
incredibly slow on my strained workstation, especially with large files. And
yet, same thing happened to me: it's become my default GUI editor.

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dfischer
I used VIM / Atom for a long time but after switching to Webstorm I just can't
look back. I don't even use crazy IDE features but the click/symbol mapping
and knowing what's in use or not is really dope. Atom didn't have anything
that sophisticated when I used it. There was a click to tag thing but it
wasn't as thorough as webstorm.

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sotojuan
I really like how easy it is to customize Atom. I'm over "OCD" about syntax
highlighting and I love how all I need to do is add some CSS and I'm done. I
know it sound small, but it's a very friendly environment if you're a web dev.
I still haven't made the full switch from Sublime but I'm using Atom more and
more.

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dbailey5
I finally gave up with atom this week, after switching between st3, atom,
rubymine and vs code I deleted all of them and just started using vim with
spf13. I liked atom and its vim-mode _alot_ but its handling of tags even with
atom-ctags never worked for me.

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epmatsw
Wow, the tab snapping in 1.9 is excellent. Looking forward to seeing that in
the release version.

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mohsinr
Atom is my main editor. It used to be little slower at ubuntu 14.04 but now on
16.04 Ubuntu, it works just fine.

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rosstex
But is it faster?

~~~
rspeer
They do mention "rendering and performance improvements", and the linked pull
request [1] mentions "much faster cold startup time and general increase in
responsiveness".

I don't know if that means it's fast enough to replace other editors now, but
it's promising.

[1]
[https://github.com/atom/atom/pull/11474](https://github.com/atom/atom/pull/11474)

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hartator
I think it's a bit disapointing to see no focus at all on performance.

~~~
krisdol
Have you tried clicking the link at the top of this page that takes you to the
release notes?

