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Am i missing out if I dont use an IDE? (lemmy.world)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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So, I have been mostly self thaught programmer (C++), as its a big part of my job (not a regular developer). But so far I have been using a simple text editor like Geany to code and I compile stuff either in terminal (linux) or produce my own make file.

I am starting to wonder if I should switch to a full IDE, as I am on linux, I was thinking of trying KDevelop. But I am simply not sure if its worth, do I even need it?

I have never used an IDE, it seems kind of complicated for the start with "projects" and I havent really found any good introductions to how this workflow is supposed to work.

Do you think using and IDE is something everyone should use? Or do you think a text editor with producing your own make files should be enough?

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

For my money: yes, you should use an IDE or something like one, but not because you're "missing out" - rather, because a plain text editor will limit your progress.

There are (still!) people around who think it's some sort of badge of honour to only use text editors, but in reality, this means they miss the syntax errors and typoes that we all make because we are human, and end up wasting hours looking for them when an IDE would let them see them.

You wouldn't turn up at a cookery school saying "I'm still a beginner, so I'm only going to use this pair of scissors" - specialised knives and utensils are part of the chef's toolkit, and becoming a better chef is just as much about learning to use them effectively as it is about memorising recipes. It's the same with programming.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I stick with vim for years out of that sort of badge of honor. Now I use vscode and nobody is taking it from me.

You can do almost anything in vim or emacs, but I can do it faster in vscode. It's a really fantastic tool and it's completely free.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

VSCode + Vim extension is where it’s at

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I stick with vim because every time I try to use vscode, I get so bogged down trying to set things up and figure out how to use it that I end up just being like, "eh, fuck it - I'll do this later."

Younger admins and engineers look upon me with awe, but really I'm just secretly a really lazy bastard. I don't even pack plugins into vim anymore to make my life easier. Just plain old vanilla vim.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

At the end of the day there’s some cost-benefit analysis for time spent setting up environment vs time saved by previously setup features. Autocomplete saves a good amount of time but even something like same-file-word suggestion can save a lot of time without any setup.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yeah, for sure - I don't deny that at all. For me, it's a confluence of general burnout, laziness, and comfort with what I already know... and likely not a really urgent need to move to a proper IDE. The majority of my coding is small, one-off Python scripts where I can :wq and run it and then open it back up to refine, fix bugs, add debugging prints, etc.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Even for that there are some nice (vim and otherwise) features where clicking on an error automatically opens up the right file and sets the cursor at the location of the error. Or just seeing errors in a separate panel from the rest of the code.