I sort of, but very reluctantly, agree. I would add that modern VIm package systems like SPF13 make it much easier and more accessible, I'd suggest the author check that out instead of continuing to maintain that 700 like vimrc file. That having been said, I still end up fixing a lot of bugs that crop up even with my SPF13 setup (the bright side is I can now contribute those fixes back to a project so others don't need to suffer).
However in the end VIm and VIm style modal editing has been, at least in my opinion, a big improvement in my productivity and flow when coding. It's so big that I can't actually bring myself to switch back to something like RubyMine which is arguably a true IDE for what I work on most (Ruby on Rails).
I'm still a bit confused at peoples love of Sublime specifically. Sublime isn't an IDE, so to be quite honest I'm surprised people choose it over the tools from Jetbrains such as Webstorm, Rubymine and IntelliJ. Its benefit over an IDE, or over VIm, is perhaps just that it is fairly simple. It's downside is that it really isn't very powerful and its VIm mode is awkward and clunky.
The sad thing to me is that there are really just a couple of VIm features that make me stick around.
1. Split management that is easy to work with.
I use this all the time. I often need to be able to look at multiple files that are part of the same context I'm working in (view, controller, service, etc.). Tab switching is not effective for this in the least. Every other tool that can do split panes does this poorly. With VIm I can just Ctrl-P<Fuzzy Search>Ctrl-X/V and it's opened horizontally or vertically relative to the current pane.
2. VIm style text navigation and manipulation.
As true as it is that it's not that hard to just click where you want, I completely disagree with the authors assertion that it's just as effective as keyboard based text navigation and manipulation. Perhaps it's just a matter of flow, but being able to select text in multiple ways, manipulate it and repeat that is amazing. For an example of just how powerful this is in certain cases look at the VImcast on the "gn".
I use that one all the time since learning about it a few weeks ago.
The bottom line for me, is that until editors learn the lessons VIm has already taught us, it's going to be extremely hard for anyone who has learned to use VIm even half decently to stop using it. Perhaps that's the biggest reason to not recommend VIm to new people. They'll never forgive you for it. It's a trap.
I agree that the author seems to be missing some of the beauty of keyboard commands and navigation. Sure Sublime does some things vim can't, but you can do things in vim you certainly can't with mouse-only input. For instance, I use visual block mode dozens of times a day, which allows identical edits to be made to multiple lines simultaneously.
I do complex search and replace very frequently, and almost always on a particular group of lines. In vim that's as simple as typing `:{start},{end}s/{needle}/{replacement}/g<ENTER>`, but in a GUI I have to select the lines with the mouse, likely reselect since I didn't get exactly the right selection the first time, then find the control key to hit <Ctrl-F> before I can even start thinking about my search terms.
I think it comes down to giving you the power to make the edits you will be doing frequently. I find it interesting the author spoke so much about autocomplete and autotab. It's probably just a matter of preference but I've always found that those features get in the way of effective coding. Every time I'm forced to use Visual Studio for something I feel like it's an unloved little kid that keeps piping up: "hey, hey I know what you want to do" but it's always sorely mistaken.
Let me replace on lines 6 through 437 of some text dump the leading curly brace with a function call to turn it into a code file and you'll win my heart, because those are the sorts of transformations that I want my editor helping with.
Actually, Sublimes multi-edit feature is actually pretty good and it's something I'd love to see VIm able to do. What I want to edit isn't always organized into neat vertically aligned blocks.
On the subject of VIm's search and replace, the VIm style regex does drive me nuts, I constantly have to remind myself what needs escaping.
Command-K, Command-Up to do open a new vertical split pane in Sublime with the current file.
Command-K, Command-Down to close the pane and move the file back, or just Option-Command-1 to switch everything back to a single column no matter how many were open.
I've used split management in Sublime. I can say with some certainty it is awkward to work with compared with VIm's. Perhaps that's partly because I'm used it it.
One pet peeve I have is that Sublime came with a VIm mode package but yet didn't implement the split behaviours for it. Also you can't "open in split" which is supported in multiple ways in VIm.
However in the end VIm and VIm style modal editing has been, at least in my opinion, a big improvement in my productivity and flow when coding. It's so big that I can't actually bring myself to switch back to something like RubyMine which is arguably a true IDE for what I work on most (Ruby on Rails).
I'm still a bit confused at peoples love of Sublime specifically. Sublime isn't an IDE, so to be quite honest I'm surprised people choose it over the tools from Jetbrains such as Webstorm, Rubymine and IntelliJ. Its benefit over an IDE, or over VIm, is perhaps just that it is fairly simple. It's downside is that it really isn't very powerful and its VIm mode is awkward and clunky.
The sad thing to me is that there are really just a couple of VIm features that make me stick around.
1. Split management that is easy to work with.
I use this all the time. I often need to be able to look at multiple files that are part of the same context I'm working in (view, controller, service, etc.). Tab switching is not effective for this in the least. Every other tool that can do split panes does this poorly. With VIm I can just Ctrl-P<Fuzzy Search>Ctrl-X/V and it's opened horizontally or vertically relative to the current pane.
2. VIm style text navigation and manipulation.
As true as it is that it's not that hard to just click where you want, I completely disagree with the authors assertion that it's just as effective as keyboard based text navigation and manipulation. Perhaps it's just a matter of flow, but being able to select text in multiple ways, manipulate it and repeat that is amazing. For an example of just how powerful this is in certain cases look at the VImcast on the "gn".
http://vimcasts.org/episodes/operating-on-search-matches-usi...
I use that one all the time since learning about it a few weeks ago.
The bottom line for me, is that until editors learn the lessons VIm has already taught us, it's going to be extremely hard for anyone who has learned to use VIm even half decently to stop using it. Perhaps that's the biggest reason to not recommend VIm to new people. They'll never forgive you for it. It's a trap.