Text editors is a topic that is sure to generate a lot of debate. Before sending in a pull request or comment about why this course should cover your favourite editor, be sure to read the rest of this page first.
This documentation includes a section on Vim and a section on Emacs. It also includes a section on an 'Emacs Distribution' called Spacemacs. There are a few simple reasons why only these editors are covered:
- Have multiple options is nice, so are critical thinking and decision making. However, especially for beginners, clear directions are better.
- These editors can all be run in a terminal and graphical window, which is great once you start to work with servers and other remote machines.
- They are all available on almost any available platform imaginable (Vim usually out of the box).
- Vim and Emacs both have a huge following and are very likely to be still around for at least decades to come.
- Being able to work with Vim is considered a basic, primary skill.
- Spacemacs turns Emacs into a fully featured IDE (it actually comes closer an OS) that does not only have Vim style editting, but is also really easy to operate.
- Spacemacs makes learning programming and all the tools surrounding it easier, providing a nice 'bridge' between GUI programs and CLI programs.
So in conclusion, choosing a text editor remains a personal choice, however:
- learning how to work with Vim is simply mandatory.
- Spacemacs is our recommended editor.
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