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Editors and IDEs
What HN commenters recommend, ranked by distinct recommenders. Under each: what people praise most and the most common caveat, or the strongest quote where there is no summary yet.
- 1.Loved for Customizability, AI agent workflows · Caveat Learning curve
- 2.Loved for Agent integration, Speed · Caveat AI over editor
- 3.Loved for Remote development, AI integration · Caveat Resource use
- 4.Loved for Bindings everywhere, Terminal workflows · Caveat Learning curve
- 5.Loved for Terminal workflow, AI agent pairing · Caveat Fragile configs
- 6.Loved for Speed, Scratch pad · Caveat Slow development
- 7.Loved for Refined and reliable, Companion to agents · Caveat Weak AI offerings
- 8.Loved for Git and code review, Rich feature set · Caveat Resource hog
- 9.Loved for Terminal workflow, Speed · Caveat Vim muscle memory
- 10.Loved for Easy contributing, Free open data · Caveat Stale POI data
- 11.Loved for Sane defaults, Vim keybindings · Caveat Hides internals
- 12.Loved for Cross-platform .NET, Beats VS/VS Code · Caveat Declining quality
- 13.Loved for Works out of box, Easy editor switch · Caveat Breaking changes
- 14.Loved for Reliable mainstay, Office replacement · Caveat Data security
- 15.Loved for Vim emulation, Best of both
- 16.Loved for VS Code minus Microsoft, Remote container dev · Caveat Extension availability
- 17.Loved for Native desktop GUIs, Responsive apps · Caveat Slow IDE
- 18.Loved for Fond nostalgia, Text-mode UI · Caveat CP/M version
- 19.Loved for Common Lisp core, Emacs replacement · Caveat Fewer features
- 20.Loved for Best for Go, Code navigation · Caveat Resource usage
- 21.Loved for Everyday editor, Code and plugins · Caveat Updater compromise
- 22.Loved for Solid IDE, Type checker · Caveat Resource usage
- 23.Loved for Code navigation, Productivity · Caveat Slow and heavy
- 24.Loved for Quick edits, Easy to learn · Caveat No code navigation
- 25.Loved for Composable stack, Helm replacement
- 26.Loved for Modern package stack, Built into Emacs · Caveat Bundled version bugs
- 27.Loved for Efficient editing, Always available · Caveat Modal editing
- 28.BBEdit's still pretty great. I love, love, LOVE that I can extend it with shell scripts or Python tools or Rust apps
- 29.stumbled on KDE/kate. It's been a perfect substitute.
- 30.JOE [0] for editing directly in terminal (Linux, macOS)
- 31.
- 32.I love these packages (like this, Spacemacs, Doom, etc.)
- 33.I switched to Eglot/Corfu/Vertico/Tempel. I much prefer the new wave.
- 34.Notepad is the best version so far, I use it as a todo list
- 35.For anyone who regularly has to look at/analyze binary files, i highly recommend ImHex [1].
- 36.PdfCraft works well enough for me that I cancelled my subscription.
- 37.I heavily used org-babel. I used it to put code for data wrangling, plots, and notes into a single document.
- 38.I have always viewed the Emacs/Slime/CL development environment as being a more frictionless approach
- 39.the most easy-to-use editor for cli / ssh and relatively lightweight
- 40.I used the PlatformIO plugin (available for VSCode-based IDEs) for programming and transferring code to the esp32.
- 41.I recommend https://www.flos-freeware.ch/notepad2.html - it's even snappier than Notepad++
- 42.The only thing I use is his which-key, and there are alternatives, such as mini.clue.
- 43.Delphi was magical. Nothing compares to Delphi's productivity.
- 44.I pivoted to jetbrains stuff— specifically Rider, PyCharm, and WebStorm.
- 45.I remember when I moved from netbeans to eclipse and the speed of compilation was amazing.