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Comment by iLemming | Hacker News Reader

> Why not just use Emacs

Emacs is an ethereal substance. You cannot "use" it. Just like with magic - there are no users of Emacs, you can be skilled practitioner or a beginner but you don't "use" magic - you apply it to create or to destroy. To slay dragons, to amaze and terrify uninitiated ones

https://twitter.com/iLemming/status/1093349152199630848

Seriously though, Emacs is hard. Especially these days, when the constant flow of distractions is intense. People these days do not have the patience for learning anything that takes them longer than an hour to grok. They'd rather duct tape things with "left-pad" solutions and call it "it just works"™, and if [insert fav editor here] doesn't support something, they lose any incentive to even try things.

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Ok, I get that from someone coming from vscode but Vim certainly takes more than one hour to grok.

My point is Emacs+evil-mode is close to indistinguishable from Vim. I know this because I come from Vim.

I think @reddit_clone hit the nail on the head. It is just an irrational adverse reaction to hearing the word Emacs.

I think I should've tried better to emphasize sarcasm. Emacs is an incredibly powerful tool. And honestly, I don't understand people who try to learn it only to complain shortly after how hard it is compared to VSCode, and they don't want to "waste their time." Dude, you chose to be in this field. A text editor is a single, the most important, the most consequential tool of your professional lifetime of a programmer. LIFETIME!!! Why the heck not spend some of that time learning it?

Cause some of us want to write code instead of screw around endlessly configuring a text editor?

You still need to tinker all the time - that's part of our jobs. You need to configure and use various tools, for note-taking, Zettelcasten, GTD, TODOs, Pomodoro, Habits, Anki-Cards, etc. You need to tinker with your terminal, write various scripts, in awk, bash, perl, python, etc. You need to manage your Postman collections, nix files, dotfiles, PDF annotations, gpg and ssh keys, shell history, browser history, browser settings, git settings, package management, jupyter notebooks, etc.

Now, Imagine if you could really learn just a single tool that could help you manage all that—one integrated environment where you can take notes, organize tasks, manage your schedule, write code and annotations, write scientific papers, automate workflows, handle version control and secure communications. Some versatile, extensible, and powerful editor that can be customized to fit all your needs, where you turn endless tinkering into a streamlined, cohesive experience, making productivity feel natural and effortless. Where if you embraced it, you'd discover how it can transform your workflow into a harmonious symphony of efficiency.

That tool does exists, but of course, why would you screw around it endlessly? After all, you have to write code instead...

Couldn't resist, since it is relevant and analogous:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34333276

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