DEV Community

Antonin J. (they/them)
Antonin J. (they/them)

Posted on

Emacs and VIM users, what's the best starters guide for a beginner?

Top comments (9)

Collapse
 
itsjzt profile image
Saurabh Sharma

if you have vim installed (already installed on Linux, macOS). then run vimtutor for an interactive tutorial.

Collapse
 
shkabo profile image
b

I made myself recently to use VIM and to give it a full go. Found some plugins, installed them and got it for a spin. At first it was a complete chaos, a one big mess with all kind of different keystrokes, bashing over keyboard, tying to find out what fits my needs, what I really need, and what is just there but not being used. After 2-3 days it all settled down. Now I enjoy working in VIM and fingers memorized all keystrokes that I need. I still miss some commands/features and will eventually find out how to do those things (multi line comment/uncomment, indentation, etc.)

tl;dr If you really want to learn VIM, start using it, and google everything that you need.

Collapse
 
guy profile image
Guy

Re Emacs, Xah Lee has some great tutorials for beginners as well as vets, and great packages, too

For the newcomer, I'd recommend:
ergoemacs.org/emacs/emacs.html

Collapse
 
antjanus profile image
Antonin J. (they/them)

ah, perfect! Exactly what I was looking for.

Collapse
 
colinmtech profile image
Colin Morgan

I tried doing vim tutorials but they always turned me off. Learning Vim is more about just doing it. Delete your other editor and leave no where to retreat. When you are doing something in Vim and it feels frustrating, google what you are doing and you'll learn how to do it more efficiently. Eventually you'll build up that knowledge and muscle memory.

Also, I kept a cheat sheet open for the first six months =P

Collapse
 
scrineym profile image
Michael Scriney

If you want to learn the shortcuts for Vim, there's a game for that here

Collapse
 
ben profile image
Ben Halpern

I'm not a user so I can't comment but there are definitely some nice beginners guides if you search vim on dev.to. Look forward to some more insights in this thread πŸ˜„

Collapse
 
antjanus profile image
Antonin J. (they/them)

well, I'll mention this. I really liked the Learn Vimscript the Hard Way which really set me up with VIM when I first started.

Collapse
 
cess11 profile image
PNS11

I think openvim.com/ is a good start.