First, somebody who claims only real programmers use Vim is probably not much of a programmer, but surely not somebody you should follow.
That said, I switched to Vim few weeks ago. I didn't have problems with arrow keys, but the mouse was what I was trying to avoid. So I also switched to tiling window manager.
My first impression: loads of fun if you like fiddling with settings. Benefits are already visible, but issues too. First advice is not to start with it too fast and on a commercial project with deadlines. You will have a slow start, you will edit .vimrc more than your code and you will be frustrated. Start slow, with sideprojects and wait till some of the regular IDE functionalities start to bother you and you start missing Vim.
Best advice I got: run vimtutor program (comes with Vim) and go through it 3,4 days in a row.
Second advice: read about plugins and search for articles about setting Vim with plugins for the stack you're working in. Vim can be a "notepad" or a VisualStudio Code, it depends on your config and plugins
My experiance from first 2 weeks with Vim and arrow keys is that its going to be hard to not to use them. Some suggest to disable them to force yourself get a hang on hjkl keys. But I have 2 issues with those: 1) not all software has Vim key bindings so inevitably, similar functionality in other software makes it difficult to completely adapt.
2) moving cursor in insert mode: i use hjkl in normal mode, i quickly escape - move with hjkl - i. .... But sometimes, I need to do several changes of single characters very close to each other, a word to the right, a line below... And all that 3 to 5 times. Escaping, moving, then hitting i to go to insert, insert single character, escape again... It is slow. I tend to do fast moves in insert mode using arrows, as hjkl doesnt work there.
P.s. and yes, I already started trying to exit Chromium with :q. ;)
First, somebody who claims only real programmers use Vim is probably not much of a programmer, but surely not somebody you should follow.
That said, I switched to Vim few weeks ago. I didn't have problems with arrow keys, but the mouse was what I was trying to avoid. So I also switched to tiling window manager.
My first impression: loads of fun if you like fiddling with settings. Benefits are already visible, but issues too. First advice is not to start with it too fast and on a commercial project with deadlines. You will have a slow start, you will edit .vimrc more than your code and you will be frustrated. Start slow, with sideprojects and wait till some of the regular IDE functionalities start to bother you and you start missing Vim.
Best advice I got: run vimtutor program (comes with Vim) and go through it 3,4 days in a row.
Second advice: read about plugins and search for articles about setting Vim with plugins for the stack you're working in. Vim can be a "notepad" or a VisualStudio Code, it depends on your config and plugins
It might possible that you are correct but with your experience side.
For me moving to arrows key again and again is deal breaker.
My experiance from first 2 weeks with Vim and arrow keys is that its going to be hard to not to use them. Some suggest to disable them to force yourself get a hang on hjkl keys. But I have 2 issues with those: 1) not all software has Vim key bindings so inevitably, similar functionality in other software makes it difficult to completely adapt.
2) moving cursor in insert mode: i use hjkl in normal mode, i quickly escape - move with hjkl - i. .... But sometimes, I need to do several changes of single characters very close to each other, a word to the right, a line below... And all that 3 to 5 times. Escaping, moving, then hitting i to go to insert, insert single character, escape again... It is slow. I tend to do fast moves in insert mode using arrows, as hjkl doesnt work there.
P.s. and yes, I already started trying to exit Chromium with :q. ;)
Your point is valid here.
I am getting so much productive information from this community.