[OT] Which IDE / Editor do you use?

Nick Sabalausky SeeWebsiteToContactMe at semitwist.com
Mon Sep 23 14:21:19 PDT 2013


On Mon, 23 Sep 2013 07:50:43 -0700
"H. S. Teoh" <hsteoh at quickfur.ath.cx> wrote:

> On Mon, Sep 23, 2013 at 02:01:02PM +0200, Dicebot wrote:
> > 
> > Ironically, this is exactly the reason I have never succeeded in
> > using the Windows for daily work. Amount of manual configuration and
> > subverting the defaults needed to make it actually usable for my
> > programming flow is outstanding. In the same time on my Linux distro
> > it is mostly `pacman -Sy gnome gnome-extra xorg-server nvidia dlang
> > vim git` and I am ready to work on a fresh install.
> 
> Ditto.

Similar here, at least these days. Last time I got a new system, it had
Win7 preinstalled. I'd already been using Windows as my primary
system (for ages), but it took me about *a week or two* of googling and
tweaking and third party hacks before I had finally got it to a point
that was more or less usable (but still frequently irritating and
impractical).

> 
> I'm surprised at people talking about the amount of time spent
> configuring stuff on Linux, etc., because it's never happened to me! I
> mean, OK, in the early days you had to manually configure X11 and deal
> with all of the obscure problems, but that's no longer the case today.
> All I have to do is 'apt-get install <package>' and it Just Works(tm).
> 

Yea, I find installing software is often (not always, but often)
*easier* on Linux these days, thanks to apt and such. It used to be a
nightmare of dependency issues in the days of dpkg/rpm[1]. But now,
most of the time it's just one trivial command. Done. Or if you prefer
GUIs, the...uhh...what's it called, Synaptec?, is just as easy, *and*
good for discoverability: It's basically a freeware app store, but
Linux had it even *before* iOS.

And when you install a GUI app it puts *one* item in the "start menu",
not "Company Name -> Program Name -> Tons of Junk including docs and an
uninstall link that's right next to the launch link"

Of course, sometimes windows is still easier, too. I get so frustrated
when I discover some Posix program through the web and it gives *no*
indication how to download or install it because they just assume
it's already in everyone's distro repos and that everyone knows what
their distro named the package, and that you're installing it *on* the
same Posix distro you're already familiar with.

For example, last night I tried to install the cmdline 7z on an OSX
machine, and after nearly an hour of completely useless *official*
webpages, and screwing around with sources, etc, I gave up.

[1] Of course I know dpkg/rpm are still there under the hood.

> I do like to tweak stuff -- and this is where Windows falls flat for
> me, 'cos it forces you to work a certain way, and when you go outside
> of that, things just stop working or it becomes an uphill battle
> (disclaimer: I haven't touched Windows for over a decade, so this may
> no longer be true today)

That's actually *more* true now than it was with XP. MS used to be
pretty big on preferences, customization, etc (maybe not *AS* much as
Linux, but still). But lately they've been very noticeably trying to
become Apple/Mozilla, complete with forcing every change on everybody
and minimizing how much they'll allow you to revert any of their
endless stream of crazy "UI flavor of the month" ideas.



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