golf VS dotfiles

I'd probably use Helix if it had 1:1 Kakoune keybindings. Or even Vim bindings.

Vim bindings are not the most consistent, but they are ubiquitous. Every program that offers Vim mode has very similar keymap. If modal text editor deviates from them, it better be for good reason.

Kakoune bindings are very different from Vim, but they are provably and objectively [1] better, so that's fine. They are also more consistent and there is a clear idea behind the whole design. It's written down in documentation. You might prefer Vim or Emacs, but at least you can see that changes from well known Vim scheme are not made at whim.

Helix keymap feels like it was improvised without any thought behind it. „Let's take Kakoune binds and add back visual mode cuz I feel like it.” Currently, they are designed by committee in this GitHub issue[2]. I don't see any design notes and explanations why should I spend time learning Helix keymap.

[1]: https://github.com/mawww/golf

People claim that their new(er) modal text editor is better/faster/requires fewer keystrokes than vi/vim/neovim, but I have yet to see some clear, objective, concrete data to back these claims up (like a benchmark of the editors for the same tasks). Is there anything of this sort? I know there's this, but it's only about kakoune/vim and it seems a little biased.

Judging by https://github.com/mawww/golf kakoune is capable of completing the majority of the same editing tasks as vim in a very similar amount of keystrokes. The main advantage of multiple selections is that you can see which text you will operate on ahead of time, rather than having to first select which operation you want (delete/yank/change/etc) and then which text it will affect. I think pointing out that vim's selections aren't as capable as kakoune's is a fair response, and saying that you can accomplish similar things without selections is a bit of a deflection.

I use NeoVim. I used Vim previously and just know the built in basics very well.

NeoVim incorporating Lua as a first class language has allowed plugin authors to build plugins that are faster and better than plugins for Vim written in VimScript (or other languages like python/typescript which are much slower).

There is a strong community for neovim on reddit, youtube, etc and plugin authors do a nice job of building tools that work with each other.

Setting it up I agree is a pain, but once done its very little maintenance/work. Even when I've had to 'redo' my setup (eg swithing package managers like vim plug to packer to lazy) its been easy and under 15 or so minutes.

I edit minor things in my config every few months. Everything flows quite nicely now and breaking changes are far less common than they used to be (at least among the plugins I use).

My vim config if you're curious (along with the rest of my dotfiles): https://github.com/sbernheim4/dotfiles/tree/master/vim

Mine's not very bare bones, but its also not massive. I like to think it's decently set up and readable. Hopefully its possible for you to use some parts: https://github.com/sbernheim4/dotfiles