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Ask HN: What are the most under-appreciated Editor / IDE features?
3 points by avasthe on Aug 1, 2020 | hide | past | favorite | 6 comments



I like the ability to find files/resources using a popup incremental search dialog rather than hunting for them in a conventional project treeview, which takes me ages. For example ctrl-shift-r in Eclipse, or alt-shift-o in Netbeans. This is how I open files 90% of the time when working on Java projects at work.

The ability to select code structurally. For example, select the function I am in, the current div, the current for-loop etc. Very helpful when working with long, deeply nested html files. It's horrible trying to eyeball the closing tag of a nested div while you are trying to drag-select it over several pages.

I love any feature that insulates me from project configuration and the build process and lets me focus on coding.


As much as it is loathed, I miss Visual Studios’* ability to drag and drop widgets on to a form then being able to click that widget and assign an on event. Being able to freely draw what ever I needed (and worry about the code later) allowed me to design a work-flow that was unsurpassed.

*Circa VB6


Built in terminal. Every single one I use has gotcha's to the point where I now use vim because the actual terminal is more handy.


Very interesting. Can you share what type of code you write and what some of the gotchas you found with IDEs?


Even if you have gone through the time when saving often was the norm, and know what you’re ‘missing’: not crashing seemingly randomly.


Multiple cursors




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