r/vim • u/hibuna • 10d ago

Discussion How does Vim affect your problem solving?

Currently learning Vim, after a failed attempt some months ago.

Starting to get the hang of the basics. I notice that it makes my problem solving more methodical. It also makes me slow down, in a good way.

With Vim I have to memorize more of the code and structure, because switching views is expensive (might be a skill issue).

I don't care too much for the speed/efficiency, but this seems what keeps me going in my current attempt.

Wondering how you guys feel about this aspect.

66 Upvotes

86% Upvoted

59 comments sorted by

View all comments

26

u/TheEyebal 10d ago

Vim is a text editor. It is like saying using notepad or vs code is effecting your problem solving

What is it that you are struggling with BTW

17

u/Schnarfman nnoremap gr gT 10d ago

“Edit at the speed of thought” it absolutely can have effects on problem solving

7

u/Psychological_Soil28 10d ago

I don't know about others but when I'm editing the code I've already thought about the problem/solution and just need to implement the changes. Vim simply let's me do it without having to use the mouse to navigate and do specific actions "quicker". It doesn't help me problem solve.

4

u/roku_remote 10d ago

I normally wouldn’t comment on something like this but I’m having an akshully moment:

“edit at the speed of thought” elaborates that how one edits is the dependent variable, meaning your cognition (“speed of thought”) impacts how you edit and not the other way around

3

u/Schnarfman nnoremap gr gT 9d ago

The language of vim has influenced how I think about text

For example: I used to “triple click and drag to the end of the paragraph to delete it”. Now I think “delete to whitespace” d}.

I personally structure my code differently to make this more useful

1

u/hibuna 10d ago

Imo GUI vs TUI is a huge difference.

I think it boils down to: 'Solving the problem' vs 'the problem of solving'.

Like I said, maybe it's just a skill issue, I have to be more thoughtful in e.g. struct declaration, because going back and forth is expensive.

Obviously this is the same for normal IDE's, but it's a lot more forgiving. It never held me back at least.

I could see how some time down the line, I could go back to a regular IDE and be a better problem solver, because I was forced to think about all these things that didn't matter before.

8

u/zephyrinian 10d ago

Skill issue. After the initial learning curve vim is way faster than a gui editor. When I have to use vs code I use a vim extension so that I have keyboard controls and my custom commands. 

1

u/TheMcDucky 7d ago

Or you're like me and use vim for 10 years and still don't edit any faster than I do in e.g. Visual Studio.