I have participated a bit in the Atom.io open source repository, but now I am back to Sublime. It's so fast and reliable compared to Atom.io.
I really keep trying to use Atom, but it's just unacceptable currently when compared to Sublime. Very slow startups and laggy. This new version takes 5-10 seconds before I can start coding, that's far too slow. With every update I keep hoping things are faster, but only marginally so. VS code loads in less than 3 seconds and is a lot more snappy.
I don't understand why they don't address this issue as the highest priority problem. It's by far the most complained about issue. If the MS guys can make VS code launch that fast I don't see anything holding back Atom (save maybe coffeescript :P (tongue in cheek)).
None of those are deal breakers for me.
Last time I had to launch Atom was when 1.8 was released. In the use case where you leave the editor running this startup time isn't a problem.
VS Code and Atom both launch a 'full' browser and server, html, css, js and the whole shebang to make all of that work; while Sublime is compiled C++ (with a python API).
Also because people often open/close tons of small files during the day instead of opening a project and working on it for hours.
Plus, the slugginess extends beyond startup time, into working with large files (were large = puny for other editors' standard) and other activities.
It seems silly to me for someone to adopt a strategy of opening/closing Atom (instead of reusing an open instance) and then complain about how long it takes to boot. You don't park your car at red lights and turn off the engine, then complain about how long it takes to pull away when the lights turn green.
> Plus, the slugginess extends beyond startup time, into working with large files (were large = puny for other editors' standard) and other activities.
This I totally get. If this is someone's use case, they probably shouldn't be using Atom.
I don't mean to rail on you in particular, I just always found the "oh it takes so long to start" complaint to be a silly one. It's such a minor thing. Atom is really good for a bunch of use cases, it's a shame that people write it off for this stupid reason.
> It seems silly to me for someone to adopt a strategy of opening/closing Atom (instead of reusing an open instance) and then complain about how long it takes to boot.
That's not what happens. They looked at the tool, stated it doesn't meet their needs, explained why, and then _did not adopt the tool_. The Atom folks can decide they don't want those users or they can address their abominable startup time, but you can't suggest "change how you do everything" and hope to win friends or users.
You didn't, until car startup time was optimized enough that modern cars do turn off the engine at red lights to save resources, then turn it back on when you put your foot down.
It is a shame people don't value users time like this any more.
Also 5 seconds is enough for my attention to maybe wander. Not every time but often enough to waste minutes of productivity per day. It all adds up. Amazon found that each extra millisecond delay causes customers to navigate away from the page. It isn't laziness just human nature.
No reason why a few hundred line markdown file with Atom should bog down an i5 quad core with 16gb of ram to point where typing 1 key takes forever while Sublime operates on it instantly.
The fact that the kill command overwrote the standard clipboard just crippled my workflow (i routinely, intentionally keep different things in the kill-ring and the standard clipboard; i just couldn't unlearn that muscle memory).
Emacs only seems speedy now because computers have finally caught up.
Either Atom will get faster, or it will add so much value it's okay being slow.
And then computers will eventually catch up, just like they did with Emacs.
Texteditors must be fast and predictable. Tab support for vscode was it for me. Also, their ide must add overhead and yet still much faster than atom
How big are the projects you are working on? When I was messing around with atom yesterday on a single small file it was great. But when I opened a project I'm working on, about 15,000 lines of C across 50 or so files, atom becomes unusably slow. 15,000 lines is pretty small compared to lot's of other projects and atom couldn't handle that. It's too bad because I like atom, I thought the plugin system was much easier than Sublime's and I liked the overall look and feel better than Sublime.
Also my computer is due for an upgrade which adds to the unusability, it's a 2010 MBP with a 1TB 840 evo and 16GB ram. The CPU is definitely lacking though, it's a 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo.
Also, its instant search across all files is quite amazing actually. Faster and more useful than any other editor I have tried