nano, vi, geany, kate…

I prefer nano - simple to use & always available. I manage remote systems often from my mobile using termius: config file editing, writing simple scripts for some analysis/automation tasks and recording task notes and status. Using a tablet I might use vi but generally prefer nano.

Helix: Barely needs a config. But they are also pretty close to done with a plug-in system for the stuff that isn’t implemented by default :D

Nano. It’s the easiest to use

Acme

When I first started using Linux I used Kate, I know, I know, not command line, but I didn’t needed a command line editor for my own computer. Eventually I started using nano for quick edits and that became my default CLI editor for a while. I don’t remember what I used as an IDE back then, but maybe it was Eclipse, although I think it was mostly just Kate.

Eventually I decided to learn either VI or Emacs, and a friend who used Emacs pushed me to that side. I ended up switching everything to emacs, CLI, IDE, I even learnt org-mode and had tables and presentations in it.

Eventually my pinky started to hurt too much, so I switched to Pycharm for python, and kept emacs for C++, text edits and org-mode. I ended up slowly switching emacs everywhere and reverted to nano.

Some years back I decided to properly learn vim. I have been using nvim for a few years, and while it’s not the everything tool that emacs was for me, it’s still pretty darn useful. I also haven’t become a movement ninja and oftentimes I go wwwwww to get where I want to be. But still, there are some very nice shortcuts that I use a lot like Change Inside/Around or Delete X lines. Macros are cool, and sometimes feel magical, but other times they don’t work like I expected and I can’t figure out why. I don’t see myself changing to something else, the ubiquity of vim shortcuts in other programs makes it very convenient when I have to use something else.

When I ran a trivia bot on irc back in the day, I used to use sed to edit question files. But mostly use nano now. I don’t do anything all day and COULD learn vim/emacs/something else. But I cbf

My first experience with *nix was a professor leading me into a server room though two biometric locks and setting up the config files for a compute cluster faster than I would have been able to open the files.

He was using Vim, and though it took me a while to learn, the sheer speed with which he was able to get us out of that unbelievably noisy server room sold me for life.

Well, I use vim for text edits and nvim+extensions for an IDE. As close to a vim purist as is reasonable. But frankly, it’s the first one you learn to use well.

Nano 4 life

kate textfile &

Been using linux full time for 10 years. I do almost all of my system admin stuff in the terminal (my desktop, laptop, home server with a few containers). But i cant for the life of me figure out vim (like i know how, but it just doesnt click for me or feel natural)… i tried a bunch of times and will keep trying… but until then, its (shamefully) nano for me

Helix + my Nix-based configuration tool

My first computer was an Amstrad 664, with a green screen. I’m old. And I’ve been around Vim and EMacs from time to time and I love the console but for the love of god, since GUIs became the normal way to interact with computers, I just install micro now and have the same hotkeys across all the modes of interaction.

Speed of typing really isn’t the defining productivity measure for code.

Now I use VS Code in a GUI and micro on the console and that provides a reasonably consistent way of interacting with text.

Team vim, but I’ve been using Helix instead for a year or two – it’s like if Neovim and Kakoune had a baby.

I have been learning vim specifically because of VimWiki. It’s always fun getting a few words into writing a document before realizing I wasn’t in Insert mode, then I have to figure out what I messed up.

Emacs → Vim → Neovim → Helix