[OT] Which IDE / Editor do you use?

[Nick Sabalausky]

On Fri, 13 Sep 2013 15:48:55 -0700
"H. S. Teoh" <hsteoh at quickfur.ath.cx> wrote:
> > 
> > LOL. Yeah, the main reason that I don't use IDEs is the fact that
> > they're essentially a glorified version of notepad as far as editing
> > goes. They _do_ usually have better editing capabilities then the
> > ever-so-pathetic notepad, but they can't do much of anything in
> > comparison to the likes of vim or emacs. 
> 
> I don't even consider a notepad a real "editor". Useful for doodling
> random notes to yourself, I suppose, in accordance with its name, but
> pretty much unusable for anything beyond that.
> 

Yea, notepad has *not* held up well. It's pretty awful. I occasionally
use it to remove formatting from text I'm copy-pasting, and that's
about it.

Even for basic "jotting down notes" I've switched from notepad over to
my fast-loading code-editor (Programmer's Notepad 2) or OpenOffice if I
want spellcheck (it's slow to load, but I usually keep a blank instance
open just in case - hey, it's still far less of a resource drain than
any web browser!).

> 
> > So, I end up using (g)vim for everything. The features that an IDE
> > has that vim doesn't typically just aren't worth it. e.g. if I'm
> > stuck doing Windows programming, about the most that I even do with
> > VS is use the debugger. I even build from the command line rather
> > than open the IDE.
> 
> We really should improve D support in gdb (or whatever other debugger
> people like to use on Windows). I've mainly resorted to writeln
> debugging, and it's really quite embarrassing. Though, I think there's
> an unfair stigma against it -- I found that well-placed fprintf's (in
> C/C++) are surprisingly effective at tracking down hard-to-find bugs
> in code involving fork() and dynamically-loaded .so's, that gdb (or
> any other debugger) would require lots of tedious setup to even begin
> to debug properly. In an embedded environment, where it's not so easy
> to substitute system libraries or install the latest debugging
> scaffolding, printf debugging may well be on par with "real"
> debugging with a debugger, methinks.
> 

I love writeln debugging. I don't have to boot it up, configure it,
learn about or task-switch my mind over to any new interface, or
actively shy away from any opportunities that don't come with a
fully-mature debugger (or wind up with my arms tied when I'm in the
debugger habit and don't have a debugger available for whatever
reason - in my experience, debuggers are reliance-forming drugs).

But the *best* thing of all with writeln debugging: Being able to
examine the entire relevant execution forwards *and* backwards in time,
all at a glance, with zero "stepping". Total win.

Any time I use a debugger I get sooo sick of having to reset and hit
"step" a million times (or muck around with conditional breakpoints,
which never seem to be intuitive - *if* they even work at all) every
single time I want to see (or remember) what happened *before*. But
with writeln - I already see the whole relevant trace at a glance, and
all with exactly the same tools and interfaces I'm already using.

Writeln debugging rocks my world.