quiet software

Quiet software (n.)

Software that is quiet when you are quiet.

I switched back to vim from VS Code around a year ago and here is a perfect example of why. I wanted to quickly look at a powershell script and VS Code was the first editor in the open with context menu, so I used it. Five things happened:

• A tab opened showing the changelog from the latest release.
• The integrated terminal opened up.
• A notification saying a newer version of the powershell extension is available appeared.
• Another notification saying something threw an error in the powershell extension appeared.
• My file opened in a background tab.

All I wanted to do was glance at the dang file. Opening that powershell script is VS Code made everything very *loud*.

If I open that same powershell in vim, it just... opens. It's just there. The cursor blinks and that's about it. The file opens and I stop to read it. When I stop, vim stops. When I'm quiet, vim is quiet.

It's like browsing the internet with JavaScript disabled, the website (the ones that work anyway) is just text, and some images. It loads and then it's done. I use a browser extension to do this on a per-site basis and a great feeling of calm descends over me when I turn JS off on an over-zealous website.

gate

2020-08-21