Re: An Org-mode clone for Vim

[Detlef Steuer <detlef.steuer@gmx.de>]

On Fri, 5 Nov 2010 19:39:56 +0000 (UTC)
Herbert Sitz <hsitz@nwlink.com> wrote:

> I've been working on a Vim plugin that is file-compatible with Org-mode and that
> clones a good subset of features.  It's gotten to the point where I'd like to
> put it up on Github and see if anyone wants to use it and/or help develop it
> with me.  So far I've implemented a good subset of Org's functionality and,
> though it has a few rough edges, right now it could be perfectly usable for
> certain people out there who prefer Vim as a text editor, but who have been
> drawn to Emacs' Org-mode because of its features.  My project isn't at the point
> where it has all the features or the polish of Org-mode, but many Org-mode users
> use only a small subset of Org.  For people who prefer Vim and have subsets
> coinciding with my project it could be an option.
> 
> I've made a video showing what it looks like and demonstrating some of the basic
> outlining stuff.  I just uploaded it to Vimeo, and it tells me it will be
> available for viewing in a couple hours (i.e., around 3:15pm PST today, Friday
> Nov. 5,2010).  When available it will be viewable at this link:
> http://vimeo.com/16543959
> 

Wow! 

There is another reason, why this can be very, very useful: If you work in a team it becomes very hard to introduce a file format which more or less requires emacs. I.e. I have a colleague who has vim hard coded into his brain. He never ever would think about starting to use emacs. Now, may be, I can convince him to collaborate in orgmode structured files. That alone is worth the effort.  

Furthermore it may be useful to use vim over ssh+screen for simple access to your orgmode files even if you use the full power at your desk.

Was there a link somewhere to try it out? Would be nice!

Did you reach a point where it interacts with vim's R plugin? That's quite usabel nowadays.

Thank you for sharing!

Detlef

> For someone who asks, 'Why would you bother to do this for Vim when it's already
> done in Emacs?", I would have these responses:
> 
> 1.  A lot of people don't like Emacs.  It is of course an insanely powerful
> piece of software, but a lot of people can never get accustomed to the chord-key
> command system, or if they do get semi-accustomed they don't like it or it
> causes them physical pain.
> 2.  Some people are of the opinion that, while Emacs is admittedly a great
> operating system/development environment, it lacks a decent text editor.  ;)
> 3.  Emacs and Vim (or Vim and Emacs) are king and queen atop the pile of text
> editors.  What one has the other should have to, to the extent possible.
> 4.  I consider myself a Vim person, but I moved to Org-mode and Emacs myself
> (made almost palatable to me by Viper and Vimpulse) because I wanted to be able
> to publish outlines to PDF and HTML.  Vim has a couple decent outliners but
> nobody has bothered to create good export systems for quality output.  I had
> written some (non-publishing-related) extensions for one of the Vim outliners
> and I knew it wouldn't be that hard to write something in Vim that was
> file-compatible with Org-mode, which would then be able to publish to PDF and
> HTML simply by calling out to an Emacs server.  This was my original goal and
> it's done and works great.
> 5.  As I did some work I became more curious about all the task management and
> organization features in Org-mode, and how they might be implemented in Vim.  So
> I started coding up stuff for the various Org searches, agenda views, sparse
> trees, column views, date management, etc.  This is actually fun to do and Vim
> is well-suited for doing it.  So I've kept going.  I'm hoping someone else might
> have an interest in doing this with me.
> 6. As I said in 5., developing this stuff is fun.
> 
> That's about it.  If there's any interest I'll do more videos showing how other
> Org-mode features have been implemented in the Vim plugin, and where they stand
> right now in the Vim plugin compared to Org-mode.
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Herb Sitz
> Seattle, WA 
> 
> 
> 
> 
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