I love the touchbar as well, because it allows me to easily change volume (swiping a bar rather than tapping the same button) etc.

However, the ESC key is also on the touchbar, which makes using vim pretty annoying.

I haven’t heard anyone say that before either. As many others I know, I don’t mind it. But I have made it more useful using this neat utility called Energy Bar - https://github.com/billziss-gh/EnergyBar

I mostly use the function keys in RStudio for R programming and for everything else I use Energy Bar for quick app launches and volume controls.

My favorite thing about the touchbar is that I can easily use all the function key functionality without having to memorize what they do for every application. A lot of applications have programmed really useful integrations into the touchbar, and this is getting better over time. It replaces a lot of my track pad usage, and generally makes interacting with my computer faster. Touchid is also nice, but I think apple should consider putting faceid on the mbp.