Vim or Emacs, what's best for a developer
 

G'day

I've been programming for about 5 years now and only now taking my first steps into the linux world. I've had a poke around Vim and Emacs and they both seem to have quite the learning curve; so I only wanna learn one and be done with it :P

I do most of my work in c++, which one is the fastest to use once you get your head around them ? Or would I be better to just ignore Vim and Emacs and find a good IDE and use something simple like nano to modify configuration files ?

This is a very delicate subject likely to start a civil war on these forums. Both editors have fanatical devotees. My rational unbiassed(???) opinion? Emacs, definitely.

the response is indeed delicate ... ^_^


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Sorry, there's no answer for the "Vi or emacs" question other than "Try both and see which one you decide you like" - there really is no convincing reason for using one over the other.

Although vim is, of course, infinitely superior.

I use vim and swear by it. Why? Because it's the first one I used so it's the one I learned commands for. I'm sure emacs is great, I just don't know how to use it. That's all it comes down to.

When I was a lad and computers were the size of houses, Vim was a powder used for cleaning sinks and baths.

I tried emacs once, but preferred to stay with vi. The only thing I don't like about vi is when I need to do a bunch of block moves. For that I prefer a graphical editor like gedit. But, like the others have hinted, vi/vim vs emacs is more or less a religious issue. My religion tends more toward vi and Debian. :)

Elvis rocks

I perfer Vi, however i find that I use nano quite a bit. I tried emacs once but I didn't like it.

It's really a matter of personal taste again, like "which distro's the best?". They're both good editors - just different.

I prefer Emacs because of the built-in psychoanalyst (M-x doctor), everyone says I need it.