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Smart tab is so… smart. I really admire how people keep coming up with creative features that immediately make sense and become table stakes right away. This applies to editors across the board. Couldn’t imagine living without command palette in VSCode, for example. Smart tab looks like something I’d be using constantly. Does anyone have experience switching from VSCode to Helix? I’m using a ton of different features of VSCode and for that reason keep thinking switching off it is hard. Debugging, keyboard shortcuts, command palette, multi cursor, all sorts of different languages, all sorts of different extensions (GitHub actions completions and checks, line wrapping that’s Markdown-aware, …), … it just does it all! The core downside is the reason I’m looking to switch: performance.

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> I really admire how people keep coming up with creative features that immediately make sense and become table stakes right away. (…) Couldn’t imagine living without command palette in VSCode, for example.

Command Palette isn’t a VSCode invention. Sublime Text already had it.

I don't have experience switching vscode to helix, but here are my 5ct regarding your concerns:

Debugging works for some languages, though it's not comparable to IDEs like vscode. It's also marked as experimental https://docs.helix-editor.com/keymap.html?highlight=Debug#sp...

Helix also has multi cursor, but probably not as intuitive when you are coming from vscode.

Helix supports many languages without configuration, except installing the language server.

GitHub actions completions should probably work through this json schema with a language server, at least I didn't configure anything and when I edit docker compose files, I have autocompletion and validation. https://github.com/SchemaStore/schemastore/blob/master/src/s...

Command palette - i don't know what you are using it for, but nearly every modal editor like (neo)vi(m) has a "command line" when pressing ':' where you can run helix commands https://docs.helix-editor.com/commands.html

With helix you can get most of the vscode features, except debugging, extensions and file management, though most of the extensions can be replaced with some other tools (depends heavily on what the extension does, can't be generalized). A plugin system is currently on the roadmap and is being worked on, but I don't think anyone could tell you when it's going to be ready.

There is a tasty looking proposal for a debugger overhaul https://github.com/helix-editor/helix/issues/5950.

`space-?` brings up the command palette in Helix.

> Command palette - i don't know what you are using it for

Discovery!

No doubt, command mode in vim et al. is probably the most powerful thing. However, as with anything shell, it all has to be laid out a priori.

Command palettes are fuzzy-finding, allowing reckless abandon for hacking into them. Single-letter commands have to be remembered, productivity suffers. Fuzzy is pretty much just as fast and grows with the user dynamically. I'll look into whether Helix has that.

Ah okay, then you want Space-? It fuzzy finds alle the available commands and shows you the keybindings next to it, so you can even search for keybindings.

nowadays i generally point $editor and VS code at whatever i'm working on and hop between them when i feel like it

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