And don't tell me no editors are really worse than any other editors. That's crap.
Why would you build a text editor on top of a web browser engine? Who would think that is a good idea?. Of course it is not going to be performant, it is being used for something it was not designed for. On top of that, cross-platform apps built using the one stack are horrible. They never feel exactly like native apps.
If this was 20 years ago, atom would be built with java using swing. It would be just as slow and just as un-native. Java apps on the desktop are ridiculed for a reason. The only difference is that now they are using 'trendy' things.
I think blind Freddy could tell you that, yes you can build a text editor on top of a web browser, but performance, and usability will suck. That is why everyone is so cynical, because it is so obvious.
And regarding Java application speed, IntelliJ is pretty much comparable with the "native" Visual Studio.
About the looks, I'm using right now Vim (GTK), Skype (I don't even know what toolkit it's using, but I'm pretty sure it's not native), Eclipse (SWT - sort of native), Pidgin (GTK), Firefox (XUL? I'm not 100% sure after 57), Chrome (Skia?), etc.
Users don't really care as long as the applications are useful and developed properly. I've used many crap and butt-ugly "native" apps...
I don't even use Atom, but this vitriol annoys me.
If you are someone who jumps between Windows, Linux and macOS using the same app then consistency in how the app works is a big gain for you, and then the impedance comes from the system you are using.
I didn't mean to imply that Java apps are bad, far from it. Many java apps are good, they just stick out like the proverbial, and performance historically was not as good as native apps. There was a time when the go to torrent application was java based and Netbeans and Eclipse were the IDEs of choice. But they made trade-offs, and two of the key ones are performance and consistent UX with the operating system. For many applications / users, this is a fine trade off to make. But Atom made a similar trade off and then the developers have spent all this time and effort trying to improve performance, and that is what I was trying to be snarky at, that its obvious why performance will always lag.
Please consider going back to the parent post and contrasting that with your way out of bounds response that ends with "everyone is so cynical, because it is so obvious" in light of the fact that all the outcomes you assume are just not right.
https://insights.stackoverflow.com/survey/2017#technology-mo...
I don't use Atom but I'm glad it exists. It improves on state-of-art in some areas and that benefits everyone.
This is why good tools are only available to enterprise customers, the only ones willing to pay for their tools, just like in other professions.
There is nothing in Atom that I can consider state of the art.
They did, and the result wasn't that bad: http://www.jedit.org/
My experience is that Engineers are just snarky and cynical. Especially about text editors. Frankly, HN is a lot more constructive than Slashdot or Reddit was back in the day.
However I held onto Textmate until 2010 and Sublime wore me down, so I'm a laggard as well.
So no negativity from me, because I just want a great editor that I can control and hack on. But I'll be real, I don't see it happening for a little bit. If sublime were to support JS plugins, I fear Atom might be in trouble at that point, TBH.
I dev on Ruby and I am a hardcore Sublime user, which is about as far away from Microsoft-friendly as you can get, and I have been really impressed by it.
Their app store is advanced, and crucially they allow Visual Studio to be setup with key bindings that match Sublime's, meaning switching over is really easy with almost little to no need to learn new macros. IDE's like Visual Studio can allow you to do code and class refactorings that make Sublime look like a joke.
It is a great app, I agree, but it also comes with its own legacy.
Not sure how difficult extending it is, but on day one in their app store I found all the important ruby bindings I needed to replicate what I value most in my Sublime set up: i.e. ruby linting and rubocop.
The switch was so painless I hardly noticed I wasn't using Sublime -- except in the moments of joy when I found the other powerful things it can do.
This stands in big contrast to RubyMine -- an IDE I absolutely also adore for its power -- but one that I found challenging to pick up due to its custom macros.
I'll have to look into the plugin API, though. I'd have to convert a lot of custom plugins, but that could be a fun weekend distraction.
BUT NOW.. for anyone else like me-- it looks like, from my quick glance, there's not much CoffeeScript left in the repo. So maybe it's time to give it a chance again.
You know JavaScript, yet CoffeeScript is inaccessible? WTF. I had never written a line of Lisp in my life before using Emacs, but that didn't stop me from writing hundreds of lines of Emacs Lisp during the first weekend that I used Emacs.
What's up with the unwillingness (or inability?) that many web developers seem to have for using more than one or two programming languages?
Also FWIW-- I've done vastly more native and server-side programming over the last... oh, seven years than "web." So... I don't think this is something with "web developers."
Having to constantly keep a mental model of two languages when you write code outweighs any benefits from syntax sugar and supposed readability.
It was nice ten years ago when JavaScript was absolutely horrendous but not now.
ECMAScript 5 was released in December 2009, Coffeescript first appeared the same month with release 0.1.0.
What was absolutely horrendous about ECMAScript 5?
edit: Javascript 1.8 shipped with Firefox 3 in June 2008.
browser fragmentation rings any bells? were you actually doing js dev back then?
Actually started webdev in 2004 php3 and basic js. Back then the joke was "nobody know how to code js, everybody just copied this one piece of code and mutated it from there".
It sadness me to think such behavior is more entrenched in todays development environment with sites like stack-overflow.
Don't get me wrong I'm grateful that sites like SO exist. I'm also grateful that when I had to learn the ropes or solve "hard problems", I could not turn to my browser. Like I do today; every fsck'ing time; because it is easier and I'm lazy.
I implied nothing, I asked you a question. Might have been a bit open ended but you made a claim that did not reflect with my reality. So I did a reality check.
If there was a "magic" moment I will give chrome released late 2008 and firebug 1.4 released early 2009 the attribution for a turning point in webdev.
X was horrible ten years ago -> but X' was actually released 10 years ago, what was horrible about X'?
sorry, there is no way for me to interpret that other than implying that my statement was false.
there were multiple magic moments, but js didn't stop being horrible on daily basis for another couple years. having chrome debugger or firebug didn't save you from having to support internet explorer, did it?
I showed IT how we can keep firefox updated on all our machines using AD.
External sites said best viewed with firefox and mentioned ie6/ie8 a steph-child.
My solution not acceptable for everybody, but my employers were happy and I could continue being productive without worrying to much about ie.
Oh, you wrote an A.I.-enabled missile launch control system in your first weekend too? ;)
The kind of debugging and refactorings you can do in that kind of set up are mindblowing, and it took me years of doing it the old vim/sublime/atom way before realizing this.
Perhaps there's lots of cynics hunched over their keyboard hitting refresh on HN so they can jump in. Who knows?
The moderators have almost certainly played a part. Selectively permitting snark from the in-group is easy in the short run, but eventually incurs a cost to the community.
Apple products are bad now despite having a pretty similar rate of technical glitches they always did
It’s just the changes impact the HN crowd more now so complaining em masse is allowed
It’s meme-tribalism
No one wants to be the one to have to give up on their meme
So it is not possible to have these discussions without the out-group interpreting your remarks as snarkiness. Handling that is hard, FUD is one way to handle it, compassion another. Social interactions are hard.
Anyone that knows JavaScript.
We put it on every kids desktop in the 1990's. We put it on every kids phone in the 2000's. We are shocked when they reinvent the wheel with in the 2010's.
Now in 2020 they are trying to tell me all the kinks are worked out with frameworks and to get your javascript to work in a browsers you first need to compile/transpile it.
Skip the whole multi-platform idea and focus on electron with all the custom bells/whistle not available on all the platforms. Btw how does meltdown/spectre affect the outlook on security with all these application in their own little v8 kingdoms?
I'm not cynical, I'm concerned.
I wanted to use a CSS framework the other day, and I all but had to rip the project apart manually just to get the files without them stuffing a heavy build tool like Gulp down my throat.
All of this... just to get some !@#$ing CSS.
The next one came with debug and GW Basic.
Followed by another one with debug, GW Basic and QBasic.
I always had to buy my Assemblers, Pascal and C++ compilers.
Which computers came with C, besides UNIX workstations?
I along with many of my fellow engineers use Atom everyday and love it. Sure it has some shortcomings but if anything this retrospective from the Atom team shows that they're trying to address those shortcomings at a rapid clip.
I love that it's an entirely open source system and that it is written in the accessible Javascript language so that anyone can contribute. I love that I feel like I can change any aspect of the editor fully, without limitations imposed by some vendor.
Atom, like any editor, is not for everybody. I don't care much for Sublime but it certainly has its strengths- I don't pounce on HN posts about Sublime spouting negativity because it's not my preferred editor.
Please, fellow engineers, before you post something negative think about a project you've worked on that you were most passionate about and cared most about and then remember that projects like Atom do require passionate developers and those developers likely deserve a bit more than snark or non-constructive negativity.
Thank you Atom contributors! I think the idea and ongoing evolution of Atom is a special project and I hope to one day make some contribution of my own, in some form, to the core or plugins!