Ask HN: Evil or vanilla Emacs keybindings for beginners?

1 pointJonathanBuchh1 comment

While I have found Vim keybindings faster and more intuitive than the default keybindings in Emacs, I was wondering if using Evil mode would backfire down the line. I have heard that some default keybindings don't work when Evil is installed and that some packages don't play nicely with Evil mode. Do you use vanilla, Evil, or some other set of keybindings in your Emacs config and why?

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I personally started with vanilla keybindings and when I get frustrated by some keybinding not feeling intuitive, I just change it to something else I like. I’ve had conflicts, and shot myself in the foot as a beginner, but you end up getting used to configuring things to your liking.

Unlike some folks, speed of editing is not usually my bottleneck so I’m happy being slower with navigating and editing. I also know diehard vim fans who switched and use evil mode exclusively and from their shared experience it’s kind of the same - some things won’t work or won’t be intuitive but they end up rebinding to their liking.

In my opinion, pick a path and commit to it. I don’t think you’ll regret it either way. If you love modal editing starting with evil mode will yield a better end experience for you once you’re proficient.

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