Why Kakoune – The quest for a better code editor
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Submission timeline
2007–2026One slot for every year since HN launched. Height is that year's peak points; orange marks a 100+ point or 50+ comment breakout. Select a bar to open its strongest thread.
First comments on top threads
HN comment orderIf you are wondering why Kakoune and not Vim, the OP claims... (you find following passages later in his post and they don't reflect my opinion) > A design goal of Kakoune is to beat vim at its own game, while providing a cleaner editing model. > Kakoune manages to beat Vim at the keystroke count game in most cases, using much more idiomatic commands. > Kakoune provides an efficient code editing environment, both very predictible, hence scriptable, and very…
Related ongoing thread: Even more hindsight on Vim, Helix and Kakoune - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36427267 - June 2023 (3 comments)
Every time I see a new text editor announced for programming, I find that is just a rehash pf unstructured text editing functionality. Programming languages are heavily structured, and code transformations between text and syntax tree forms have been implememted numerous times. So why the focus on editing plain text instead of trying to create an editor that actually transforms the syntax tree directly? I don't know what the UI would look like, but an editor that is based on…
The first top-level comment from each of the four biggest threads, in HN’s own order. Excerpts are shortened; open a comment for full context.
- Breakout years
- 3
- Total points
- 968
- Total comments
- 461
100+ points or 50+ comments
reference only — not used in Hall rules or ranking
reference only — not used in Hall rules or ranking
Every submission
| Date | Title as submitted | By | Points | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016-12-13 | Why Kakoune – The quest for a better code editorFirst breakout · Best thread | petepete | 631 | 327 |
| 2018-05-18 | The quest for a better code editor | strmpnk | 4 | 0 |
| 2018-07-13 | Why Kakoune – The quest for a better code editor | dsego | 1 | 0 |
| 2018-08-17 | Why Kakoune – The quest for a better code editor | tosh | 145 | 45 |
| 2020-11-24 | Why Kakoune – The quest for a better code editor | imran3740 | 3 | 0 |
| 2020-12-16 | Why Kakoune – The quest for a better code editor | psalminen | 3 | 0 |
| 2021-08-13 | Improving on the Vim Editing Model | diegocg | 2 | 0 |
| 2023-06-21 | Why Kakoune – The Quest For a Better Code EditorHall induction · Latest 20+ point return | r3trohack3r | 179 | 89 |