use Perl

• more productive? (Score:1)

  by duff (16) on 2002.04.25 14:24 (#7536) Homepage Journal

  Does all of that stuff really make you more productve? I find that syntax highlighting and "code completion" just get in the way more times than not. Thus I use vi in all it's varied guises and I'm perfectly happy.

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  • Re:more productive? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Mr_Perl (2788)

    Code completion annoys me. It seems intended to be a crutch for those who don't yet know the language very well.
    
    Syntax highlighting on the other hand makes it very easy to spot typos in Perl. If you mis-quote something, or leave off something you shouln't, you'll know it because the next few 'paragraphs' of code will be the wrong color.
    • Code completion (Score:3, Insightful)

      by lachoy (1663)

      In Java, I find it useful for when I'm learning a new library. It's also decent for using libraries that implementLongFunctionNamesForEverything() so I can just type 'imp<TAB>' and pick the right one. In that other language, it's also useful for argument order, particularly for overloaded methods.

      Chris
      M-x auto-bs-mode
    • Re: Code Completion (Score:2, Informative)

      by Smylers (2592)

      Code completion annoys me.

      Automatic code completion would probably annoy me too, but in Vim I find Ctrl+P invaluable for completing partially typed words.

      For example if you have a variable called $inner_template_filename then merely typing $inn then pressing Ctrl+P will type this. It's a great time-saver, reduces typos, and means that using meaningful identifier names is much less painful.

      (There's actually slightly more to it: Ctrl+P repeatedly cycles through different previously-used words that ca
      • Re: Code Completion (Score:2, Informative)

        by Dom2 (2981)

        Just for reference, that's the same as M-/ in emacs. It's called dynamic-abbrevs and it's a very handy tool.
        
        -Dom
  • Re:more productive? (Score:1)

    by chicks (2930)

    Does all of that stuff really make you more productve? I find that syntax highlighting and "code completion" just get in the way more times than not. Thus I use vi in all it's varied guises and I'm perfectly happy.

    I'd really hate to go without syntax highlighting for anything significant. It helps catch a lot of errors earlier. The implementation in vim [vim.org] catches a number of stupid typos before I try to run the code. I've tried various code completion things, but I've never found any that worked better th