I switched to #helix editor because three advantages weight me more than disadvantage of having to learn away for #vim shortcuts:

1. Too much legacy.
2. Too many plugins.
3. It is a varying challenge to install the latest version #neovim, which anyway needs to be done in order not to break init.lua (and that big pile of plugins).

So for the price of few weeks inconvenience I can stop spending time on text editor configuration and/or figuring out on how to install it.

I used #vim and later on neovim fo the period 1998-2023, even before using Linux. I switched to vim in MS-DOS from text editor called #QEDIT :-)

@jarkko certainly an interesting choice. I'm grappling with this myself. On the one hand, VIM keybinds are ubiquitous and if I use an alternative editor or IDE such as Android Studio I lose the easy jump back and forth from neovim if I've relearnt helix keybinds.

@jarkko I didn't regret it:

https://codeberg.org/mo8it/dotfiles/commit/1ef19372843759054497d34544d1406b459620d7

@mo8it yeah, exactly. this was getting too insane :-) i liked vim the most when it did not have many plugins... then it also did not matter much which vim version happened to be around.

@jarkko I keep finding interesting experiences people have around #vim . I started by using vim motions on VSCode, but found it slow (undo takes seconds). Then I tried nvim with the #LazyVim distribution but found it overwhelming. It went from a minimal black screen with text to a willy wonka UI with millions of moving pieces.

I'm giving another try to #neovim but adding as few plugins as possible and only one by one. What I meant with all this is: I agree, plugins are too much.

@almenal99 i have no strong opinions on text editors, which is probably obvious already since i switch it every 10-20 years at most :-) it feels to me like discussing whether bosch or makita is superior if i was doing renovations sort of...

@jarkko I really like helix but haven’t committed to taking the plunge. I hope too that one day they will have a native app.

@almenal99 @jarkko I think what you're doing now is right. IMO everyone should start with a stock insurance and begin setting up your keybindings and options the way you want. From there, only reach for plugins when you REALLY want a new functionality. I think it's important also to make tweaks as you go. I see so many people kill full days on tweaking their config. However i think it's better to just keep your nvim config file open and hack on interleaved with your day job.

@shanecelis
an app native to what platform
@jarkko

@tshepang @jarkko For me, macOS but I’d be happy to see it support any non-terminal just for the sake of knowing the architecture will support different front ends. It’s not super important but it’d be very nice in the future.

@shanecelis
helix works on macos though, or maybe I misunderstand what you say
@jarkko

@tshepang @jarkko Yes, it does in the terminal but not as a native gui app.