Programming

This is a lightweight code editor which implements a concise yet powerful subset of vim commands, and adds support for multiple selections, by adding selection-based editing commands from plan 9's sam editor. The latter is nice for refactoring larger codebases. For example, one can define a selection for a variable name, add all its occurences, then visit each match to make sure a change does not shadow another name, and then change it all at once. That's great because I am a fan of good names, and since programs evolve and change, names should be changed, too!

What makes vis nice is that - in difference to vim descendants like kakoune - it remains still largely vim-compatible, so that one can easily continue to use vim (or even learn vim better, due to vis' magnificient concise man page ;-)).

Of course, kakoune is also powerful, light-weight, vim-like, and really nice, thanks to its visual support for multiple selections. But kakoune is (because of its "selection-command" 'editing language' syntax, different from vim's "command-selection" syntax) a big step away from vim - and my own experience is that it is hard to learn several of these "large" editors well, because they contain so many details one has to memorize, and which the human brain is gleefully happy to throw out after not using them for a few weeks. And for me, vim is already a (or more precisely the) secondary editor - I use it for quick tasks, git and jujutsu commit messages, embedded system and admin stuff, but not for writing large programs. And vim is an excellent match for these use cases, since it is basically installed everywhere.